This plane was seen flying lower than normal over Prince Albert on Wednesday, causing a stir on social media about what it could be for. (Submitted Photo/Facebook)

By Logan Lehmann

Too close for comfort

Low flying aircraft strikes fear, confusion among P.A. residents

Aug 17, 2023 | 5:14 PM

Some residents in Prince Albert got quite the scare on Wednesday after a small airplane was seen flying closer to the ground than normal.

People took to social media to talk about why it could be flying so low, with some saying it was a training flight while others said it was a pilot preparing for an emergency landing.

It turns out that the plane was contracted by SaskPower.

“It’s part of an annual project that we do where we use a fixed-wing aircraft that flies about 1,000 feet above the ground for the purposes of patrolling our transmission infrastructure,” said Scott McGregor, SaskPower Spokesperson. “Just to get a bird’s eye view of its condition, gather some data, do some photography and also lidar. We’ve been doing it since 2016 and the work in P.A. wrapped [Wednesday], there might be some supplemental patrols [Thursday] but that’s what was going on.”

As mentioned, one of the ways that SaskPower helps conduct its surveys is through lidar technology, a remote detecting method that uses light in the form of a pulsed laser to measure distances to the ground.

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Although they just wrapped up in Prince Albert, McGregor said that planes are still flying as SaskPower crews across the province do the same surveys around the same time every year.

“We do this all over the province,” he said. “The whole province, wherever they got transmission infrastructure, we do our patrols and unless we have a reason to go back out, it’s just the one survey for the area and that should be it for the year.”

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loganc.lehmann@pattisonmedia.com

Twitter: @lloganlehmann