Crash Survivors Criticize Search After They're Found By Accident

VANCOUVER, B.C. - A couple who survived the crash of their light plane and lived three days on wild berries, mussels and creek water are accusing rescue crews of botching the search for them.

"We're starting to get a bit mad about what happened," Sheila Patterson said from her Vancouver home. "Our families and friends went through hell."

Patterson and her husband, Brian "Bugsy" Johnson, were found accidentally Friday by the crew of a police helicopter taking a coroner to look at the crash site.

The couple's amphibious plane, flown by Johnson, flipped after it landed on Gaultheria Lake near the northwest coast of Vancouver Island.

The two escaped from the sinking aircraft and swam about a quarter-mile to shore.

Searchers arrived within hours but found only an oil slick, debris and the couple's identification.

They assumed the couple, who had been out for a sightseeing flight, had sunk to a watery grave. The search was called off.

Family notified

Family members were notified, and Patterson's brother even wrote an obituary for the couple.

But on Friday, a coroner preparing a report on the deaths was flown over the site, and the couple were spotted - bruised and shaken but alive.

Johnson, 48, said he and his wife, 41, left the area of the crash and followed a creek to the ocean, where they earlier had seen kayakers.

Wearing only light, summer clothes, they created a crude encampment, lighted fires, drew a huge SOS on the beach and waved a tarp to try to attract attention.

They never gave up hope, but not seeing any searchers was unnerving.

"It was really the fact we couldn't contact anyone. That was the worst part. There were two days of awful silence," Johnson said. "We knew someone would come."

Johnson believes rescue workers are at fault for not making a wide search of the area. "I think there was some bad decision-making," he said. "They jumped to the easiest conclusion."

But Maj. Don Thain, the officer in charge of British Columbia's Rescue Coordination Center, reviewed the file on the search and concluded everything was done properly.

He said Johnson and Patterson made the two worst mistakes possible after an air crash: They left the scene and didn't leave indications where they had headed.

Family celebrates

The couple's return was a cause for celebration by relatives, all of whom had lost hope, except for their 8-year-old son, Lewis.

"I thought they did a nose dive in their landing," he said. "I thought they jumped and swam to shore."

Friends and family members greeted the couple with a huge cake, decorated with a small chocolate airplane diving nose-first into the icing, carrying the inscription: "Bugsy and Sheila, Welcome Home. You Are Grounded."