Business

Plane Crash in Canada Almost Wipes Out Key Rare Earth Metals Company

Scroll Down For An Update To This Story:

A plane wreck in Canada could have had a seriously harmful impact on the development of rare earth metals in North America. The good news is that this appears to be a near miss. The terribly sad news is that there were fatalities.

Avalon Rare Metals Inc. has taken a temporary blow in its management ranks. The Canadian-based company has issued a release stating that three of its staff and four visitors were injured in the crash of Arctic Sunwest’s Twin Otter floatplane in Yellowknife on Thursday. The charter plane was flying back from Avalon’s Thor Lake exploration camp when it crashed into Yellowknife’s Old Town neighborhood.

The three company employees are all senior executives: Brian Chandler, Chief Operating Officer; David Swisher, Vice President Operations; and Kelly Cumming, Northern Relations Manager.

The release also lists “four other visitors” and says that the group was returning from a tour of Avalon’s Nechalacho Rare Earth Deposit located about 60 miles east of Yellowknife. Fortunately, none of the injuries suffered by the seven passengers were fatal.

Tragically, the two pilots were killed in the crash.

Avalon stated that it has no information on the circumstances surrounding the crash and that the crash is under investigation by aviation authorities.

In America (where a great deal of Avalon’s business takes place), shares of Avalon Rare Metals were down just over 2 percent at $2.86 and the stock hit a new 52-week low today.  The new 52-week trading range is $2.80 to $10.11.

Aviation wrecks have gutted companies before. While it it tragic that the two pilots lost their lives, one can be grateful that it was not worse. This looks to be one of those rare cases that were a near miss for Avalon and its senior management.

Read The Globe and Mail’s updated report of the accident.

(Jon C. Ogg/Becket Adams –24/7 Wall St./The Blaze)

Update: Because of a well-written and insightful comment from comrade Transmogrifier, a rogue apostrophe has been identified, caught and liquidated. Thank you.

Comments (16)

  • The Gooch
    Posted on September 26, 2011 at 12:57pm

    Um. this is one of the most bizarre slants I’ve ever seen taken with any story presented on this forum. “Something tragic ALMOST happened to a company… oh, yeah: Two apparent nobodies died.”
    Wow.

    Report Post »  
    • The Gooch
      Posted on September 26, 2011 at 1:29pm

      Becket Adams, that update redeems the odd, detached angle you took on this story. You are my hero for the day. Hooray! You may be human after all.

      Report Post »  
  • Wixom35
    Posted on September 26, 2011 at 11:22am

    I thought companies that are publically traded – no more than two senior executives can fly on the same plane – because of something like this tragic loss.

    Report Post »  
    • Independent American
      Posted on October 4, 2011 at 11:14am

      To comply with the spirit of the Sarbanes-Oxley act of 2002, officers and directors of a public company who are killed in an accident are guilty of acting contrary the interest of public shareholders. Their bodies (or remains) are to be publicly displayed without clothing before they are to be ceremoniously buried at the nearest federal prison. Their families are to be stripped of all assets and turned into the streets as the criminals they are for their parts in allowing their family members to be thusly killed.

      Accountants and lawyers are to be called in to audit and persecute in the event any officer or director actually makes a profit on shares owned in a public company, thereby reducing the profit that may have been made by public shareholders.

      In the end, public companies are to be run by mindless bureaucrats, not independent, creative, insightful, courageous, hard-working entrepreneurs. Socialism wins. Capitalism loses. Washington, DC is happy!!!

      Created under the cover of prosecuting corruption, Sarbanes-Oxley is anti-business, anti-profit, and anti-American at its socialist heart. Fueled by corrupt lawyers (but I repeat myself), the laws necessary to deal with fraud were already on the books, but laying additional financial burdens on American companies was the goal, not justice.

      Sarbanes-Oxley needs to be repealed and its proponents publicly flogged.

      Report Post » Independent American  
    • Independent American
      Posted on October 4, 2011 at 11:15am

      Note that in the prior posting “persecute” is not a typo.

      Report Post » Independent American  
  • andreastesfaye
    Posted on September 24, 2011 at 10:22pm

    Actually, the Uranium came from Port Radium on Great Bear lake, as far as I know.

    Report Post » andreastesfaye  
  • wethepeoplepress
    Posted on September 24, 2011 at 10:14am

    Yellowknife is where the raw material was taken from to create the bombs we dropped on Japan I was told while flying in. I flew into yellowknife 20 years ago when it was simply a dirt runway built into the side of a mountain. The mine was accross a small valley from the runway into the side of the next mountain. You could see all the yellow deposites around the adit or tunnel entrance.

    Report Post » wethepeoplepress  
    • DJEyeDub
      Posted on September 24, 2011 at 4:59pm

      Okay let me begin by stating just how very, very, WRONG you are about Yellowknife, where it is and what resources are found here.

      First we do not mine any radioactive material, and no “the bomb” material was NOT from here although we’d be proud if it was. Our local area mining is (was) Gold and to the north diamonds. We do not have mountains anywhere near Yellowknife and our runway has been paved and international for the past 40 years.

      Yellowknife is a community of 20K people it is the capital city of the Northwest Territories. We are the frontier hub for exploration companies. We had three gold mines (two within city limits) but have all since shut down and are being reclaimed. The landscape is shield rock, forests and a million lakes and rivers. Yellowknife is on the shores of the ninth largest lake in the world (4th in North America). So please get your facts straight before commenting.

      I knew people on that plane. We are saddened and shocked that it was fatal but also blessed that it could have been al lot worse.

      PS I love Glen Beck, listen to him because he usually proven right the world is in big trouble; united we stand and God Bless America! During one of the last GB shows on Fox it was cool to see the ticker read Northwest Territories Royal Visit under GB while he spoke. Glen if you want to visit a truly amazing place come to YK, NT CAN. Summer/Fall is the best time of year.

      Report Post » DJEyeDub  
  • Transmogrifier
    Posted on September 24, 2011 at 8:53am

    Only morons form plurals with apostrophes, Mr. Adams.

    Report Post »  
    • RONALDAS MAGNUS GENIUS
      Posted on September 24, 2011 at 9:29am

      Thankz fer da grammer lessen….Unless you are a academic hack, trolling the blaze just to make snide comments, then you aready understand that the readers of the Blaze will forgive a spelling error here and there because we are much more interested in content and factual reporting than we are eloquent, flowing, and beautiful lies written by most other new outlets.

      Please Blaze reporters, please continue to give us the news misspellings and all…It’s the message not the delivery! I wish that I could say the same for other news sites. If all they can criticize is the punctuation and spelling, I’d say they are too far gone for the truth.

      Report Post » RONALDAS MAGNUS GENIUS  
  • www.ithp.org
    Posted on September 24, 2011 at 5:51am

    Very good reporting here. Thanks The Blaze

    —-

    http://www.ithp.org

    Report Post »  
  • Any_One_But_Obama
    Posted on September 24, 2011 at 4:46am

    THE SATELLITE HAS LANDED…

    NASA won’t tell us where but the media wants us to believe it was either in Canada… or Africa… That seems like a huge swoth of land between these two continents. But that is what they claimed: http://url2it.com/hqtp

    Report Post » Any_One_But_Obama  
  • Chuck Stein
    Posted on September 24, 2011 at 3:51am

    Typically, mining for rare earth metals has Thorium as a “waste” product. Using 1960′s technology, a piece of Thorium the size of a marble can supply an American’s LIFETIME energy needs. Check out http://energyfromthorium.com — it explains the Liquid Fouride Thorium Reactor.

    Report Post »  
  • aint it grand
    Posted on September 23, 2011 at 10:17pm

    Fascinating anyhow about how this company mines these minerals from up near Yellowknife. It’s amazing, all the things that the earth holds, and we literally just scratch the surface.

    Very sorry for the loss of life and injuries.

    Report Post »  

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