Footage shows the moment when a large boat in Alaska gets dangerously close to a floatplane in a bid to prevent it from taking off.
The U.S. Coast Guard in Alaska said it was investigating Tuesday’s incident in Halibut Cove, with local authorities, after video of the vessel intentionally circling around the plane went viral on social media.
The floatplane’s pilot, Eric Lee, described the incident as a ‘dangerous maneuver’ and told several local news outlets that seven passengers were onboard the aircraft although none of them were injured.
Footage, captioned ‘serious road rage’ on Instagram, shows the gray boat agitating the water by repeatedly revolving around the taxiing plane, creating waves as both the vessel and floatplane make their way out of the bay.
It remains unclear as to why the watercraft was trying to destabilize the plane and whether the pilot and the navigator knew each other, although it has been reported that the boat was being steered by a woman, who remains unidentified.
Sightseeing floatplane pilot Eric Lee described the ‘dangerous maneuvers’ that a local businesswoman on a boat had made while he was trying to taxi for take-off with seven passengers onboard his aircraft in Halibut Cove, Alaska, on Tuesday
A man on Instagram filmed the close encounter from nearby, captioning the video: ‘serious road rage’
Lee’s floatplane was leaving the area to bring tourists to Katmai National Park when the boat interfered in its bid to take-off. The unidentified woman steering the boat has not been named although the U.S. Coast Guard and local authorities are conducting an ongoing investigation
Austin McDaniel, a spokesman for the Alaska State Troopers, told Anchorage Daily News on Thursday that the agency had not issued any citations or carried out any arrests in relation to the incident.
Lee, who owns Alaska Ultimate Safaris in Homer, said he was about to embark all seven passengers on a sightseeing tour to Katmai National Park and Preserve when the boat suddenly interrupted take-off.
He was also in Halibut Cove to pick up two passengers who were staying at a nearby resort, the Stillpoint Lodge.
‘The aluminum boat was coming toward me, I thought they were trying to get around me at first,’ the pilot told Alaska News Source. ‘Then they started weaving back and forth fairly close to the aircraft.’
With little space to roam in the clove, Lee added it would have been complicated to steer around the boat and that he was worried by the possibility of hitting it with his floatplane.
‘My concern level was high because she was — it appeared to be within inches — but more than likely within feet of our wings,’ Lee said. ‘Had she, at those speeds, hit our wings, I just assumed it was going to be a catastrophe and we would have to evacuate.’
The pilot added that it would have been a nightmare scenario to evacuate all seven passengers onboard in the middle of the cove.
‘If the boat did actually hit me, how was I going to get them to get out of the aircraft and to safety,’ Lee further told Alaska News Source.
‘Because the tide runs through there pretty fast and sometimes creates a pretty strong current, and it’s fairly cold water and, of course, the sides of the bay are fairly rocky too, so it would have been a tough maneuver if I had to do that.’
Pilot Eric Lee (right) said he had never encountered anything like Tuesday’s incident in his 20 years of flying. Pictured: Lee and his wife, Kristen, in Alaska next to a helicopter
Lee said he was trying to navigate around the boat but was fearing that he would eventually hit it and force all seven passengers to evacuate in the middle of Halibut Cove
Another boat, however, emerged, and pressured the woman navigating the vessel to stay clear of the floatplane’s path. She was identified as a local business owner.
Lee was then able to resume take-off and take all seven of his passengers on the sightseeing tour to Katmai National Park.
He added that he didn’t report the incident to local law enforcement, though the Federal Aviation Administration and the Coast Guard have contacted him about it.
‘I just don’t know what to think of it, other than it could have been a very bad situation very quickly,’ he told Anchorage Daily News.
The pilot added that he had never experienced an encounter similar to the one on Tuesday in his 20 years of flying.
‘Nothing so obvious has ever happened, nothing like that,’ he concluded. ‘It’s definitely strange at first.’