KENMORE, Wash. — The seaplane industry in the Pacific Northwest is close-knit, and from that comes a community pool of ideas and solutions.
When a DHC-3 Otter aircraft operated by Northwest Seaplanes crashed into Mutiny Bay last year, killing all ten people on board, Kenmore Air was called to provide information about the plane.
The company is known as an epicenter of knowledge for the Otter.
"We've been operating the Beaver for 50 years and the Otter since the '80s," said David Gudgel, CEO of Kenmore Air. "We build them from the ground up and we not only do that type of work, but we actually create parts and provide them to operators around the world."
Every time the FAA issued an airworthiness concern or directive, Kenmore Air created a fix.
"What in the world can't you improve on, right?" said Eric Ellison, the director of maintenance for Kenmore Air.
When the directive came out focused on a missing lock ring on the horizontal stabilizer trim actuator -- which controls the aircraft's position at take-off, cruise and landing -- Ellison and his team knew it was serious.
"When you lose the connection to the actuator, then you wouldn't have control over the angle of incidence of the tail plane anymore," Ellison explained.
Kenmore Air halted manufacturing to focus on creating a redundant safety mechanism, making it easier to locate and check.
"We now have safety wire that's visible from an inspection port outside the aircraft. So, you can look in and see that it's physically safetied. This safety wire prevents the nut from unscrewing, should something happen to the clip," said Ellison.
The FAA approved the part and so far, Kenmore Air has sold 35 kits with orders stacking up for another 20 kits.
According to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), there were two previous DHC-3 plane accidents involving the stabilizer where both planes immediately pitched down. Neither accident involved the stabilizer coming apart.
"We just wanted to add a belt and suspenders approach to make sure that couldn't reoccur," said Gudgel, adding that he believes there's no better replacement for the Otter. "They are, hands down, the best bush plane ever created."
Kenmore Air will continue to create parts. "We want to make sure we are providing the safest platform possible," said Gudgel.
The NTSB's final report, to be released by the end of the year, will outline a cause and any fixes or changes that need to be made to this type of seaplane.