Pilot Uses Cell Phone To Call For Rescue

A Piper Cherokee Six (photo of type below) crashed late Saturday evening in a densely-wooded area a few miles northeast of Pellston Regional Airport in Michigan. The plane's four occupants all survived the crash.

According to local fire rescue personnel the aircraft lost power and crash landed coming to rest nose down against a tree. The plane's wreckage was strewn across several hundred feet.

Pilot Dave Garland, 41, and his three passengers were all injured and remained strapped in the aircraft until rescuers found and cut them from the fuselage using the jaws of life.

Garland reportedly radioed the Pellston airport after the plane's engine quit. Pellston Fire Chief Randolph Bricker told the Associated Press, "My heart fell right to my shoes when I heard Dave on the radio," said Bricker, who knows Garland and had been talking with him via radio minutes before the engine stopped. "The last thing we heard from him was, 'We're going down.'"

Bricker said Garland and his passengers had attended a winter festival in Michigan's upper peninsula and were on their way back to Detroit. Bricker says Garland heard a US Coast Guard helicopter give his general location on the radio, and used his cell phone to call local dispatchers helping to pinpoint the crash site.

According to Bricker, the search took about two hours and involved more than 20 agencies. "It's a miracle," Bricker said, "It was quite a rescue when you sit back and look at everything that was accomplished in such a short time."

Garland and his passengers were all taken to area hospitals with serious to severe injuries.

Officials with the Federal Aviation Administration were on the scene to begin on investigation Monday.

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**   Report created 2/12/2007   Record 2                                      **
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IDENTIFICATION
  Regis#: 4258R        Make/Model: PA32      Description: PA-32 Cherokee Six, Six, Saratoga, Turbo
  Date: 02/11/2007     Time: 0216

  Event Type: Incident   Highest Injury: None     Mid Air: N    Missing: N
  Damage: Unknown

LOCATION
  City: PELLSTON   State: MI   Country: US

DESCRIPTION
  ACFT FORCED LANDING IN TREES FOLLOWING LOSS OF ENGINE POWER NEAR PELLSTON,
  MICHIGAN

INJURY DATA      Total Fatal:   0
                 # Crew:   1     Fat:   0     Ser:   0     Min:   0     Unk:   
                 # Pass:   4     Fat:   0     Ser:   0     Min:   0     Unk:   2
                 # Grnd:         Fat:   0     Ser:   0     Min:   0     Unk:   

WEATHER: 220 8KT, VIS 5SM, OVC 029 M09/M13 A3001

OTHER DATA
  Activity: Pleasure      Phase: Cruise      Operation: OTHER

  Departed: HANCOCK, MICHIGAN           Dep Date:    Dep. Time:     
  Destination: PONTIAC, MICHIGAN        Flt Plan: IFR          Wx Briefing: 
  Last Radio Cont: 
  Last Clearance: 

  FAA FSDO: GRAND RAPIDS, MI  (GL09)              Entry date: 02/12/2007

FMI: www.faa.gov