Friday, March 21, 2008

Stolen Engine

Here's an aircraft problem I've never had, from the Timmins police blotter.

This week Crime Stoppers and the Timmins Police Service need your help in solving the theft of an engine. Sometime during the early morning hours of March 3rd, 2007, unknown persons had attended a residence on Golden Avenue in South Porcupine and stole an aircraft dual ignition engine with a wooden prop, including the drive assembly. There was also damage done to the aircraft to facilitate the removal of the engine.

The cost incurred from the theft is estimated in excess of 15 thousand dollars. The suspects fled the scene by snow machine and headed north across Porcupine Lake.

This made me laugh because it's such a northern Canadian crime. Note that the airplane in question was at the guy's residence, possibly sitting on skis on the lake, or on a packed strip on the property. Realize, please, that the only change I made to the article as shown on the police website was to correct a typo. I did not make up the town of South Porcupine on the shores of Porcupine Lake. It's real. It just sounds like the places I make up. For those of you from snowfree climes, snow machine is another word for snowmobile, a small track-driven vehicle with skis on the front, typically used for hunting and other transport over snow and ice. Including, apparently, theft of airplane engines.

That the propeller was made of wood, and that the engine, propeller and damage associated with removal only total $15,000 suggests that it was a homebuilt airplane. I wonder what the thieves plan to do with their loot.

9 comments:

Unknown said...

You would think it would be easy to follow the snow mobile tracks!

John Schlosser said...

Look for the guys with the prop driven snow mobile.

nec Timide said...

@Randy:
Until they merged with the hundreds (if not thousands) of other snowmobile tracks. In many northern communities snowmobiles, in winter, (and their tracks) are more ubiquitous than cars in southern communities. I'm sure this is the case for any small town Timmins.

Lord Hutton said...

presumably there aren't many things to steal there? I for one certainly assumed you had changed the Porcupine name;-)

silver horde said...

My MIL has a home built airplane, in pieces, in her garage, she'd only be too happy if someone would steal it.

Anonymous said...

Similar crime in southern England last year. A _very_ expensive motor glider was stolen, in its trailer, from a gliding club and found a few days later by the side of the road chopped in two with the engine and cockpit missing.

http://www.genesys.net/eb28stolen/

No idea what they wanted it for but I wonder how many other uses there are for the modern little engines in many light aircraft these days (snowmobiles?). Apparently quite a few get stolen like this in Germany. The theory is that the engines go eastwards from there.

Anonymous said...

Stealing aircraft engines,and by the way severely damating aircrafts, is something that is unfortunately becoming more and more common in France....
There were several occurences of such thefts recently.

Anonymous said...

I can vouch for the name "South Porcupine" for I went to college there...

I was told when I was there, that Timmins (including South Porcupine) had the most bars per capita then any other ontario town. I'm not sure if it's true but this story certainly makes it seem more so.

Dagny said...

Timmins.

*snort*