US congressman swims to safety after his plane is forced to land on a lake

Wisconsin Congressman Tom Tiffany has said he sustained minor injuries after a plane he was on landed on a lake, forcing him and the pilot to swim to safety.

Tiffany, the state’s Republican nominee for governor, was travelling in a small plane on Saturday night when the aircraft encountered a mechanical issue, forcing the pilot to make an emergency landing in Lake Wausau, the county sheriff’s office said.

Tiffany said he and the pilot called 911 once they landed.

“As the plane began to submerge, we exited the aircraft and swam to a shallow area, where we waited until emergency responders reached us by boat,” Tiffany wrote on social media. The pilot also sustained minor injuries.

Tiffany was coming home from a dinner in La Crosse County when the plane suddenly lost power as it approached Wausau Downtown Airport, he said on Sunday.

Authorities received a 911 report of a plane crash on the lake at 20:49 local time (02:49 BST), the Marathon County Sheriff’s office said in a press release. The pair managed to get out of the plane and to shallow water where a Wausau Fire Department airboat rescued them about 15 minutes later, at 21:05 local time, according to the sheriff’s office.

The office said Tiffany and the pilot were the only two people on board the Beechcraft K35 – a single-engine plane, also known as a Bonanza, that can carry up to five people.

“God was watching over us tonight, and I am incredibly grateful to be here in the hospital with my wife, Chris, by my side,” Tiffany said. “An experience like this reminds you just how precious life is.”

He received a small cut over his right eye in the incident, his campaign said.

The cause of the mechanical issue was not immediately clear, and the sheriff’s office said the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the incident.

The plane remains in the lake as emergency crews work to remove it, the office added.