NTSB Shares Preliminary Report on Alaska PA-24 Crash

Report indicates aircraft bounced on the runway multiple times and ‘possibly had a tail strike’ before killing four.

Jack Daleo

Thursday, September 17, 2026 at 12:31 PM ET

Verified

Edited By:

Travis Tingle

The airport at Seldovia, about 136 miles southwest of Anchorage, Alaska [Credit: Rebecca Douglas/Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities]

Key Takeaways:

A Piper PA-24 Comanche crashed near Seldovia Airport, Alaska, killing all four occupants (pilot and three passengers).
Witnesses reported the aircraft approaching unusually low and fast, bouncing multiple times on the runway, and appearing to attempt a go-around before it went off the runway, struck a tree, and submerged in a nearby slough.
The NTSB's preliminary report details these witness accounts, which are central to the ongoing investigation into the accident.

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Witnesses said that a Piper PA-24-260 single-engine Comanche that crashed near Alaska’s Seldovia Airport (PASO) last month, killing the pilot and three passengers, was approaching the runway unusually low and fast, according to the NTSB’s preliminary report on the accident.

The aircraft went off the end of the gravel runway, coming to rest in the Seldovia Slough. Aerial photographs of the airport show water off both the approach and departure ends of the runway.