Emergency Landing: An Unforgettable Experience from Randy Alcorn

Subsequent to the story I last posted, about the tragic event in Kenya with AIM AIR, I've decided to post another story about an aviation incident that occurred twenty years ago today, but with a much happier ending. This story comes from Randy Alcorn at Eternal Perspectives Ministries and it's about an event that happened to him and his daughter while he was in Alaska speaking at a missionary conference.

This story again brought back memories of a similar event that my brother-in-law related to us some years ago. He was flying by himself in a New Tribes Mission plane in Mindanao in the Philippines and had just taken off when an oil line on the engine broke. He was able with God's help to make a silent and safe landing.

Randy Alcorn actually has a video of when almost the same thing happened while he was in a plane near Palmer Alaska.

Twenty Years Ago Today: Rescued in Alaska

Today is the twentieth anniversary of an unforgettable experience.

In 1989, I’d spoken at a missionary conference in Palmer, Alaska. Afterward, we were headed north to Galena, on the Yukon River, by small plane. My ten-year-old, Karina, and I were flying with our missionary friend, Barry Arnold, and his daughter, Andrea, also ten. Nanci and our daughter Angie were leaving with the rest of Barry’s family an hour later in another plane, tak­ing a different route.

Well into the flight we were cruising over a beautiful waterfall at three thousand feet, when suddenly the engine lost power. We saw smoke. Realizing that there was no oil pressure, Barry had to shut off the engine, which looked like it was about to burn. Suddenly we were descending rapidly in a rough mountain pass where there was no place to land. It looked like we wouldn’t make it.

Read the entire story HERE