A 73-year-old Minneapolis man walked away from a plane crash in Otter Tail County with what was believed to be non-life-threatening injuries, and the wreck sat undiscovered for hours before anyone even knew to look. David Ness was identified as the pilot and sole occupant of the small personal plane found unoccupied in a farm field about three miles north of Pelican Rapids.
According to the Fergus Falls Journal, the Otter Tail County Sheriff's Department did not receive a call about a possible plane crash until 8:14 a.m. on Monday. Officers who responded located the unoccupied aircraft in the field, only to later determine that the crash had actually happened the day before.
Timeline Points to a Sunday Evening Crash
Investigators determined the crash occurred around 5:20 p.m. on Sunday, per the sheriff's statement carried by the same outlet, meaning the plane sat in the field for roughly 15 hours before it was reported. Ness suffered non-life-threatening injuries and was taken to Lake Region Hospital by private vehicle, the report notes, rather than by ambulance from the scene.
The sheriff's office was assisted at the scene by the Pelican Rapids Police Department, Pelican Rapids Fire Department and Pelican Rapids Ambulance, according to the same account. As Pioneer Press also reported, the Otter Tail County Sheriff's Office is investigating alongside the Federal Aviation Administration, which maintains its own accident and incident data on crashes nationwide.
Investigation Still in Early Stages
No further details on the cause of the crash, the aircraft's flight path or its intended destination have been released. It also remains unclear what led responders to eventually locate the plane in the field near Pelican Rapids, beyond the Monday morning call that first alerted the sheriff's department.
The crash adds to a string of small-plane incidents reported across the region in the same stretch of days. Four people survived a small-plane crash that went down in a cornfield near the East Troy airport, according to WTMJ, while a separate crash at a Buffalo, Minnesota airport killed one person and left another in critical condition, per Bring Me The News.
For now, the Otter Tail County case remains open, with the sheriff's office and FAA continuing to look into how a small plane ended up down in a farm field north of Pelican Rapids, and why it took roughly half a day for anyone to find it.
