West Wind Aviation Flight 282
ATR 42-320 · Loss of control due to atmospheric icing
From Fond-du-Lac Airport, Fond-du-Lac, Saskatchewan, Canada to Stony Rapids Airport (YSF)
Event
- NTSB case
- ENG18WA016
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Unknown · led by another country; figures from NTSB notifications
- Event fatalities
- 1 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- 25
- Survivors
- 24
- InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
- 24
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- Airline
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Not recorded
ATR 42-320
- Flight
- WEW282
- Aircraft type
- ATR 42
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- C-GWEA
- Operator
- West Wind Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- 1
- Route
- From Fond-du-Lac Airport, Fond-du-Lac, Saskatchewan, CanadaTo Stony Rapids Airport (YSF)
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Non-U.S., Commercial
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Takeoff
- Defining eventThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Unknown or undetermined
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Fluids/misc hardware
From the investigation findings the Wikipedia article reports, sorted into the NTSB's cause areas with AI assistance.
Approximate · Coordinates from the Wikipedia article; not checked against an investigation report.
From the Wikipedia article
West Wind Aviation Flight 282 was a domestic passenger flight from Fond-du-Lac Airport to Stony Rapids Airport, Canada. The aircraft was an ATR 42-320 registered C-GWEA. On 13 December 2017, shortly after taking off from Fond-du-Lac, the ATR-42 lost altitude and hit the ground. All 25 passengers and crew initially survived the crash, but one passenger later died of his injuries in hospital. Investigation into the cause determined that the crash was caused by ice contamination on the aircraft.
Accident
The accident took place on December 13, 2017. According to the weather forecast, it was cloudy with temperature as low as -19 C. At 6:15 pm local time, the aircraft began its takeoff roll from Fond-du-Lac Airport. During the initial climb stage, the aircraft lost altitude and impacted the terrain 600 m away from the runway. There was an 800 foot trail of debris. The aircraft finally came to a stop in the upright position yet tilted to the right. The most serious damage was on the left side of the airframe, where it ruptured near seats Row 3. There was no explosion nor fires at the crash site, but fuel leaks were found by nearby residents who rushed over for rescue work.
Survivors were initially trapped in the aircraft, with local residents helping to free some by cutting through the fuselage. Passengers attempting to escape found the emergency exits were unable to open, with four passengers taking half an hour to open an aft emergency exit. Passengers who were able to leave the aircraft guided local residents to the crash site. Alerts were sent out through Facebook, calling for more resources, and in 10–20 minutes more people arrived with blankets. Within a few hours, all aircraft occupants were rescued.
There were 25 people on board, including 22 passengers, 2 pilots and 1 flight attendant. Nobody was killed initially, but six passengers and one crew member received serious injuries, at least five of whom were transported to hospital via air ambulance. The other 18 aircraft occupants received minor injuries. A 19-year-old passenger died on 25 December 2017 as a result of his injuries.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
Transportation Safety Board of Canada launched the investigation. BEA, ATR (aircraft manufacturer), Pratt & Whitney Canada (engine manufacturer), and Transport Canada also sent representatives to the site. Flight recorders were recovered and sent to the lab in Ottawa.
West Wind Aviation's air operator certificate was suspended on 22 December 2017 by Transport Canada, due to deficiencies in the company's operational control system. They were allowed to fly again on May 8, 2018, after Transport Canada said West Wind had addressed the regulator's concerns about deficiencies in the company's operational control system.
A year after the crash, the preliminary investigation made by the Canadian TSB suggested that icing might have largely contributed to the crash. The departure airport of Flight 282, Fond-du-Lac Airport, was not equipped with adequate deicing equipment. Polls conducted by TSB also revealed that at least 40% of pilots rarely or never have their aircraft de-iced in remote airports. Due to these findings, recommendation on better de-icing procedure throughout remote Canadian airports was issued to Transport Canada. Subsequently, investigators ruled out engine failure as likely cause of the crash. The final TSB report attributed the crash to icing.
Text from the Wikipedia article “West Wind Aviation Flight 282” (revision 1364275662, retrieved 2026-09-18) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out. Read the article
NTSB narrative
The Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB) has notified the NTSB of an accident involving an Aerospatiale ATR 42-320, which occurred on December 13, 2017. The NTSB has appointed a U.S. Accredited Representative to assist the TSB investigation under the provisions of ICAO Annex 13 as the State of Manufacturer and Design of airplane components.
All investigative information will be released by the TSB.
Verbatim NTSB factual narrative from the NTSB dataset
Sources
Wikipedia article: West Wind Aviation Flight 282
- Revision
- 1364275662 · 2026-07-15 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q45493810
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record ENG18WA016
- Event ID
- 20180302X42354
- Case number
- ENG18WA016
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "West Wind Aviation Flight 282" (page 56049741, revision 1364275662); merged with NTSB case ENG18WA016 (events / aircraft)
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site
- Map position
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia article coordinates
- Aircraft, operator and route
- Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports); gaps and aircraft details from NTSB record ENG18WA016
- Operation
- airline flight number in the infobox
- Fatalities
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia infobox: aircraft fatalities
- Ground fatalities
- Wikipedia: not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (2)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "West Wind Aviation Flight 282" and NTSB case ENG18WA016, matched by the same aircraft registration and date. For this event outside the United States Wikipedia's values are used where the two differ; each value names its source.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: local date. Values present in the bulk record are kept.