Alaska plane stolen

An Alaska airline mechanic stole an empty Alaska Airlines plane and took off from Sea-Tac International Airport in Washington state before crashing near a small island Friday night.

The carrier said it believed a ground-service agent employed by Alaska affiliate Horizon Air took the plane and that no passengers or crew were on board other than that person. The plane was taken from a maintenance area at around 8 p.m. PDT and wasn’t scheduled for a passenger flight, according to the company.

Sea-Tac Airport

Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor said he has been told the aircraft was stolen by a 29-year-old Pierce County resident. “There is no indication this was a terrorist act of any kind,” he said in an interview. Authorities didn’t name the employee.

Alaska said late Friday night that the individual wouldn’t be positively identified “until remains are examined.”

Mr. Pastor said the plane crashed on a small, sparsely populated island off the coast in south Puget Sound after being followed by military aircraft for a short time, and caused a fire. Alaska said in a statement that military jets were scrambled from Portland but it doesn’t appear that those jets were involved in the crash. A tweet from the Pierce County Sheriff’s public information officer identified the pursuing aircraft as two F-15 fighter jets.

Mr. Pastor said the crash site had been located and crews were working to control the blaze. Local news in Seattle broadcast aerial video showing a fire still burning on Ketron Island at 10:30 p.m. PDT.

Even before emergency crews reached the wreckage in the remote location, eyewitness reports and unofficial air-traffic control audio depicted a roughly 45-minute drama that played out in skies over the Seattle metropolitan area.

‘I’m not quite ready to bring it down just yet’

—Pilot of the stolen Horizon Air plane

Alaska identified the plane as a Horizon Air Q400. The twin-turboprop plane manufactured by Bombardier seats 76 passengers, according to Alaska’s website.

The episode forced controllers to temporarily halt departures and reroute some arriving planes at the busy hub, while travelers used social media to describe the concern and confusion throughout the terminals.