Ottawa

Plane makes unplanned landing on Outaouais highway

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Pilot unhurt after landing Sunday afternoon on Highway 5 near Chelsea, Que.

A small plane was forced to land on Highway 5 near Chelsea, Que., on April 22, 2018. Police say the pilot wasn't hurt. (Roxane Leouzon/Radio-Canada)

A small plane was forced to make an emergency landing Sunday afternoon on Highway 5 in western Quebec.

The pilot landed at around 4 p.m. on a northbound stretch of the highway near Old Chelsea Road, about 15 kilometres northwest of downtown Ottawa, according to the Sûreté du Québec.

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The provincial police force said no one was injured and the plane was not damaged.

Traffic, however, was disrupted nearby as emergency crews rushed to the scene.

Oona Woods said she was driving back to Ottawa on Highway 5 when she spotted the low-flying plane.

"You know the way you can kind of predict a trajectory and think, 'If that carries on at the same speed and we carry on at the same speed, we're going to be at the same place at the same time?'" she told CBC Radio's Ottawa Morning on Monday.

"So I was like, 'Oh my God,' and floored it, just got underneath, and in the rearview mirror the plane landed, between cars, in the middle of the road and carried along on the highway as if that was a normal thing to do."

Woods, who's married to CBC Ottawa traffic reporter Doug Hempstead, said the pilot seemed "cool as a cucumber" as he set the plane down.

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Possible engine failure

Lieut. Patrick Barbary of the Chelsea Fire Department told Radio-Canada the pilot decided to land because he feared his plane's engine was about to fail.

Barbary said that such a malfunction would be extremely rare.

By Sunday evening, the pilot was in the process of getting the plane towed away from the highway's shoulder.