A small plane has crashed near Dillingham, AK. Former Senator Ted Stevens (R. AK) may have been on board. Stevens was convicted of lying on financial disclosure forms about expensive gifts he received from an Alaska businessman, but the conviction was later overturned.
Updated to presumed dead.
CNN just reported that Reuters confirms he was aboard the aircraft.
CNN is still trying to confirm the Reuters report. The NTSB reports that four of the nine occupants survived the crash. There are doctors on the scene.
Former NASA administrator Sean O’Keefe may also have been aboard.
It would be one of those freaky coincidences in life, as his first wife died in a plane crash in Anchorage many years ago.
CNN confirming O’Keefe was on board.
BBC TV is saying there are survivors and doctors are on the scene. Says Stevens and O’Keefe were both on board.
BBC TV is now saying 4 survivors out of 9 on board but still no names.
This is one of those circular events that happens from time to time. Stevens was appointed to the Senate after Sen. Nick Begich died in a plane crash in Southeast Alaska back in 1972. Begich’s son Mark was narrowly elected over Stevens in the last election cycle after Stevens’ conviction.
Ah shit, morning caffeine deficit. Stevens succeeded Bob Bartlett, Don Young was appointed after the Begich crash.
When we were in school in Hawaii, there were a lot of Alaskans attending the university too. One was some sort of health administrator working on his master’s who was also a pilot. I recall one time him telling about complaining to an insurance agent about the high cost of airplane insurance in Alaska. He said the agent told him it was because: “It’s not a case of if you bend your bird, it’s when you bend your bird.”
That seems quite premature. There were survivors, apparently. He might well be one of them.
If an 86-year-old man can survive a plane crash, that’s one tough MoFo.
It’s apparently a DHC-3 Otter, which is a workhorse in Alaska. My bet is that they were on a fishing charter, as that area is one of the best fishing grounds in the world. We flew on one into Katmai Lake in that same vicinity. I have no idea what the handling characteristics might be.
You don’t survive 40 years in the Senate by being soft.
Wow, I can’t believe this.
I hope he’s OK. Sad to hear about the deaths, though.
And the prosecutor was charged with misconduct. I’m willing to give Sen. Stevens the benefit of the doubt and assume the charges were cooked up specifically to influence the election.
If he did die, it’s a shame.
Well, no. The verdict was overturned because of prosecutorial misconduct, not because Stevens was suddenly found innocent. Stevens, not the prosecution, demanded the immediate trial. Had he not done so, it’s certain that he would have been re-elected.
You know, the crash happened many hours ago, and authorities have been on the scene for quite some time. They know there are four survivors. Do they really have to hold the news up for next of kin ID or have they (the families/authorities/media) put the kibosh on it? Why don’t they just name the survivors? Do they really not know if Stevens was on the plane? Do they not require flight plans in Alaska or something? :dubious: I’m not being impatient; I just think that we’d have known this info already if there wasn’t something going on.