I got a call from Valley County Search and Rescue here in McCall this afternoon (Saturday 16). Apparently there has been a report of a missing aircraft that may have been participating in the Johnson Creek fly in. The details were sketchy. The other detail was this aircraft had been missing for two days. No ELT has been detected in the area, although that is not uncommon in previous accidents in this rugged area. The sheriff was only notified today. Does any one know of this aircraft so we can have some more details? Tomorrow, unless we hear otherwise, A search will begin involving several aircraft working with Valley County Search and Rescue.
Update:
Apparently the CAP is now involved in the search and we have been asked to stand down . (this is reported information so details may be inaccurate)The aircraft is reported to be a Cessna 172 from California. There were two people , a man and woman. They were planning to base camp at Johnson Creek and took off to explore other airstrips. They did not return. It was stated that this pilots personal limit was no airstrips under 2000 feet. Lets hope we find them ok!

Thanks,

Idaho SuperCub

The missing aircraft belongs to and flown by, Berk Snow. I talked to the sheriff and theCAP today, they are looking everywhere, but nothing so far.

We launched two aircraft out of McCall around noon. At around 2:30 the wreck was located. One person was visible, a woman, close by, the other was not.The wreckage was found about 8 miles north of Johnson Creek. I just heard that LifeFlight made it in and there appears to be a fatality. Sorry guys we did our best.

IdahoSupercub

I just got back from the Smiley Creek Father's Day fly-in. Yesterday the caretaker came up to me to see if I was CAP. The plane I was flying recently was a CAP plane and has the red/white/blue paint schem. He then relayed the info to me that they had received...basically the same that has been posted. A lady ran over to the lodge to lookup the owner on the internet. Was he someone that posted on here? Hate to hear of an accident so early in the year...or ever for that matter. If anyone has any info, please keep us updated. Meanwhile they will be in my thoughts and prayers.

Fly Safe.

Berk's buddy, John and I flew our planes into JC at the same time on Friday morning. We were to meat up with Berk there for the fly in. We then found out that Berk had done a day trip the day before but had not returned. Evidently this would have not been unusual for him but on the second day it was decided to call it in.

I flew back to Nor cal this morning and brought John's girl friend back and dropped her off a bit south of Weed so John could stay and help out.

Just got a call from John's girl and she said that she had just recieved a call from him and that Berk's wife is in the hospital and will be ok but that Berk is dead and still in the plane and his body will be retrieve in the morning.

We should learn from this that when we leave for a side trip we should let folks know where we are headed and when we will return. We may have called for an earlyier search had we known what he was doing.

I met John and Berk two years ago at Smiley creek and fast became friends.

Tim

Just watching the Boise 10:00 news right now. They've got it wrong as usual, reporting both deceased tonight.
Active weekend for flying news stories, the first three stories tonight were Berk's, a guy that ran a 180 out of fuel near Nampa and flipped it over dead sticking it onto a road, and three people getting killed in Lake Oswego, Oregon in a crash on the way to Twin Falls.
Does anyone know yet the day of Berk's crash or if he was killed at the time of the actual crash? It would be even worse if a $700 PLB would have saved him.
Be careful out there.

I just talked to a friend who talked to Berks wife. Suzie said that Berk flew up a canyon and they couldn't climb, nor turn around. She has a broken neck... but survived three days until found! She said Berk's last words were "we are going to crash" Please God, may we all learn from this tragedy. God Speed to Berk on his flight through eternity.

Tim and all,

Thanks for the update, Very sad news. Our thoughts and prayers for Berk and all who knew him and a speedy recovery for his wife in a very sad time she will be in our prayers.



Bushwheel Crew.

Hey everybody.

This is really a poor discovery checking in on monday morning to find out about the fly-in that I wasn't able to attend. I am truly saddened that we've lost Berk. Although I never met him in person, he was a really great addition to our forum and contributed often and with a great online personality.

Damn, poor guy.

I was reading over several of Berk's posts. I had never met him, but the impression I got from the posts is of someone who was familiar with mountain flying, recognize the value of mtn. instruction, and had set some limits for himself that were appropriate. "tie down by ten" "fly light" and often talked about staying within his comfort level. As illustrated by the post below, he was obviously very perceptive of the beast that may have ultimately bitten him. How often have any one of us recognized our comfort limits, whether with short strips, scud running, mountain winds, crosswinds, approaches to minimums, etc. and consciously stepped just a little further toward (or over) the comfort boundary in the interest of expanding our "experience level". The other, less desirable, path beyond the comfort zone is distraction which keeps us from recognizing that we were approaching danger. I would certainly have an easier time with these extremely unfortunate tragedies if I could establish a disconnect between the victim's actions and my own. However, it doesn't seem like Berk was a risk taker or in other ways unsafe. Always lots of self reassessment after these things. My condolensces to those who knew him and are dealing with this loss.

Matt

Berk wrote:Is it okay if we discuss the relevance of the factors that created this inextricable situation, so that we can all learn how not to repeat it?

I'm always very leary about flying *up* canyon, particularly when low & slow, and it's too narrow to do a turn to lowering terrain, comfortably.
There may be some times when this may be necessary - the question then becomes - when would these choices be appropriate, and when not?
Thanks for everyone's input.

The very best wishes to the pilots who have survived this mishap.

Berk

Hi everybody, this really sucks to here about Berk. I never got to meet him, only conversed with him here at BCP.org I think we all felt it in out gut that something was wrong. I for one could since the apprehension in those at the flyN. I’m really glad Berk’s wife Suzie is going to make it. Thank God for the CAP! I learned a lot from all my BCP.org friends at JC. #1 I knew and y’all told me, Rob, you need mountain training and seat time to fly around here. That's why after I landed my M7 sat there till I went home. This tragedy with Berk really drives that message home. I look forward to meet with y’all in the future. Fly safe my friends….Rob

Very sad news.
If you think this can't happen to you, take the AOPA online Mountain Flying Course About 1/2 way through ( I think, it's been awhile), there is a video filmed in plane that went down in what sounds like a similar situation. It is pretty scarey.

Prayers go out to Suzi and the rest of Berks family...

My most sincere condolences to Suzi, Berk's family and friends.
I only knew Berk from this forum. Berk was cool! I just knew that from his posts, very deliberate and honest. I googled him yesterday and found a photo and realized I had seen him in another photo posted from Burning Man. That's how I remember Berk. He will surely be missed.

Here is a news article on KMUD's website that goes into a bit more detail. Article

I am so sorry to hear about Berk and his wife. It’s both better and worse when a friend dies doing something he loved to do, and that you also love to do.

The “wrong canyon” error is easy to make when departing from Johnson Creek for Big Creek if you’re not familiar with the area. The road to Big Creek goes over Profile Summit, which is quite low—around 6,000’. It’s tempting to think you can fly low over to Big Creek via Profile, especially since it saves having to burn off a bunch of altitude after the crossing to land at Big Creek. I’ve seen many aircraft flying a few hundred feet over the summit when I’ve been on the ground at there.

However, there’s a box canyon due north of Yellow Pine that looks and feels like it’s the way to Profile Summit and the Big Creek drainage, but it’s not. It tops out over 9,000’. Profile Summit is one drainage over to the east. If you follow the road from Johnson Creek, it goes north to Yellow Pine, then jogs east a few miles, then turns north again up towards Profile Summit. You can lose sight of the road because it’s surrounded by tall timber.

I made the mistake of flying due north from Yellow Pine one time. I kept looking for the road down below, thinking that I just wasn’t seeing it. Turns out I was flying up the wrong canyon. Fortunately, we were light in the 182 and were up to 10,000 before I got very far north of Yellow Pine. By the time I recognized my mistake, we were higher than the box end of the canyon.

I’d like to think I wouldn’t have gone up the wrong canyon without the altitude, but I’m not about to say it couldn’t happen to me. I would never count on a gps for navigation in the mountains, but a gps with terrain warnings could save your bacon if it can pry your mind off of the conviction that everything’s fine when it’s not.

I’m not saying this is what happened to Berk. Just something to look out for based on my own experience in that area.

Again, I’m so sorry about Berk. I appreciate his contributions here and will miss his presence here.

CAVU

I'm going to miss him and his spring water. He was a super cool guy, one of the best most sane humans I have ever met. He would always talk me out from under what ever dark cloud I was under when we met.

Zona, thanks for posting that great photo.

I've been thinking about this while driving for the last 4 hours, and I'll still don;t have much to add other than I am really sad I didn't get to meet this character named Berk. I'm bummed that he had to lose his life to reiterate to all of us the risks of canyon flying. The rewards never outweigh the risks.

My heart goes out to his wife and their family.

Jr,

Probably not. Remember, those things require a bit of altitude to save your behind. I suspect by the time most of us realized we were really in trouble, we'd already be way too low for one to help.

We just had one of these, with a little more positive outcome a couple weeks ago in Montana, folks.

Hopefully, we can all do better in future.

Blessings to Berk and his family.

MTV

Hi,

About 10:30MDT Sunday, my wife and I flew our 182 from Smiley Creek (U87) to Big Creek (U60) for lunch. We had heard about the 172 which had failed to return to their camp at Johnson Creek. It was discussed at the annual Father's Day Fly-In Breakfast at Smiley Creek.

My wife and I are former CAP members (I was a Utah Search Mission Coordinator and Mission Pilot for years), so we decided to do some informal searching on our own nickel.

After departing Big Creek (marker D on Acme Mapper, see below) at 13:00 MDT, we flew to Johnson Creek (3U2) at 9500' while returning to Smiley Creek, with the intent of doing both a visual search and a listening watch on 121.5 MHz (by unsquelching the SL40).

About 3 mi north of Yellow Pine at 9500' (we could see Yellow Pine township and the Johnson Creek airstrip, marker A on Acme Mapper) we clearly heard three sweeps of an ELT on the unsquelched SL40. Time was 1321 MDT. Did a modest expanding circle search in an attempt to re-aquire the signal, but never heard it clearly again, just could hear the background noise in the receiver being modulated at about the same rate as an ELT sweeps. Didn't have enough fuel to loiter very long.

We relayed the coordinates to Center on 121.5. A helicopter in the area heard the radio traffic about the ELT, and began searching the area. We headed off to Smiley Creek to get our camping stuff, and returned to Salt Lake at 1700 MDT.

Last night, I Googled the news to find the TV link. From reading that account, and the discussion here on backcountryPilots, I see that the aircraft was found at about 1430 MDT, at Crater Peak, which I assume is near marker B on Acme Mapper, and is about 5 mi north east of where we heard the ELT.




http://tinyurl.com/22oh2r

Hi Mike,

Thanks for your search efforts. My wife, Holly was enroute (works for SkyWest) during your S&R effort and heard your transmissions on Guard. She mentioned them when she got home that evening, and I wondered...

I have been away from the media and the computer for the last few days... Sure am sorry to hear about Berk. Best wishes to his friends and family. He will be missed on the site.

Carry on.

M