A Valley man and his nephew are lucky to be alive after their plane crashed into Lake Pleasant over the weekend.
The crash could've ended very differently. Mahmood Tehrani says he was able to escape his sinking plane seconds before it plummeted beneath Lake Pleasant waters.
Tehrani says he was soaring through beautiful skies with his nephew Fabien when things started to go very wrong. A pilot for 21 years, Tehrani says he can't figure out why his plane stopped working midair.
Tehrani says they were about 600 to 700 feet above the lake when his engine started to shake and lose power. That's when the plane started diving down and Tehrani says he tried to avoid slamming into the ground.
Tehrani was then able to aim towards the water, going into a controlled crash.
"[I] opened the canopy and I told my nephew to get out and then I tried to get out," Tehrani said. "My shirt was hooked to something, and then I went into the water a little bit, maybe five seconds. Then I yanked my T-shirt so I could release from the airplane and it went down."
That's when Tehrani says he was able to swim to safety.
Both Tehrani and his nephew were able to escape the crash with minor injuries. Tehrani says he will fly again because it's his passion.
The NTSB reports there have been 57 incidents with planes over the last year, almost all involving single-engine type planes like the one Tehrani was flying.