2 dead, 1 injured in small plane crash in Tofino

Two people are dead and a third seriously injured following a plane crash and fire, Tofino RCMP said Thursday.

Police say the runway crash happened at 12:48 p.m. PT at the Tofino-Long Beach Airport in the Vancouver Island community about 200 kilometres up-island from Victoria.

Initial information indicates a six-seat aircraft may have suffered an engine fire on takeoff, police said in a statement.

The release state three people were in the plane: two who died at the scene, and a third who was pulled from the plane and taken to hospital with serious injuries.

No other people were on board.

'Plane was just in flames,' witness says

Derek Michaels was walking along Long Beach in Tofino when he saw the plane appearing to struggle after takeoff, making sharp turns with a plume of smoke trailing behind one of its engines.

He said it then took a nosedive and disappeared behind a tree line, before "a big puff of smoke" rose from where the plane appeared to go down.

"About 15 minutes later we heard the ambulance and fire trucks," said Michaels, in Tofino for a vacation with his family. "I went in my truck, and I drove up to the airport, and that's when I noticed that the plane was just in flames and there was people around and paramedics."

Michaels said the plane flew "pretty low" over them, about 200 feet before the aircraft seemingly tried to return to the airport. 

"We noticed something was wrong right away when it kind of straightened out over towards us because it was quite windy," he said. 

"It was kind of pushing the plane from side to side as it was straightening out, but then my partner noticed that there was a little plume of smoke behind one of the engines, and I guess it maybe had a failed engine or something like that."

Michaels said the speed the plane went down surprised them. 

"We both even said, 'Holy moly, that's quite the descent' because it literally descended really fast," he said. "I kind of thought something kind of happened because once you see something dive that fast and then you see the smoke ... it's not really a landing."

A video of the crash scene posted to social media by Tofino resident Chris Bedford shows a thick column of black smoke rising from the airport grounds. 

Bedford said in an online message that his wife was waiting for a flight when she took the video after the crash. 

In a statement, Tofino mayor Dan Law expressed his "deepest condolences" to those impacted as well as "gratitude to all our first responders who assisted with this incident."

RCMP, the Transportation Safety Board and the B.C. Coroners Service are all investigating.

The airport is surrounded by the Pacific Rim National Park Reserve.