Wisconsin GOP gubernatorial candidate Tom Tiffany walked away from a nighttime plane crash into Lake Wausau with twelve stitches and a vow to keep campaigning, crediting his pilot's quick thinking and divine intervention for saving both their lives.

The single-engine Beechcraft Bonanza carrying Tiffany and pilot Leonard "Len" Boltz lost power on its final approach to Wausau Downtown Airport, forcing an emergency water landing that sent the aircraft skipping across the lake at an estimated 70 to 80 miles per hour. Both men escaped the sinking plane, swam roughly 100 to 150 feet in the dark, and stood in chest-deep water waiting for rescue crews who were scrambling to locate them.

Hours after leaving Aspirus Wausau Hospital, Tiffany held a news conference Sunday and recounted the ordeal to Fox News. The U.S. representative for Wisconsin's 7th Congressional District, now running for governor against Democratic Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, described the seconds between the pilot's warning and impact.

"Len said to me, 'We are going down. Pull your seatbelt tight.' And that's exactly what I did. I gave it a yank and pulled it good and tight. It was probably about 10 seconds later. We hit the water."

Tiffany's head slammed into the dashboard on impact, opening a gash above his right eye that required twelve stitches. A CT scan found no apparent concussion, though doctors told him to watch for symptoms and to stay off airplanes for several days. Boltz, 73, received four stitches for his injuries. Both men were treated and released.

Boltz raised the landing gear with seconds to spare

Tiffany credited Boltz, a former Air Force pilot trainer, with a split-second decision that may have kept the plane from flipping on contact. With only seconds between the power loss and the water, Boltz retracted the landing gear before the Bonanza hit the lake surface.

Tiffany praised the move at his news conference:

"He was savvy enough and quick enough to think about, 'We've got to make sure and pull that landing gear up.' He did that, and it might have saved us. We're fortunate the plane didn't flip. I just take that to the skill of the pilot."

Wausau Mayor Doug Diny, himself a former military pilot, reinforced the point. "The last thing anyone wants to do as a pilot is put the aircraft in the water at night," Diny said. The remark underlined how narrow the margin was, a nighttime ditching with no power, no runway, and no room for error.

The aircraft was a four-seat 1959 Beechcraft Bonanza K35, Breitbart reported. The plane remained submerged in Lake Wausau as of Sunday. The FAA is investigating what caused the engine to lose power.

Dispatch audio captured a frantic sixteen-minute search

Dispatch recordings obtained from Broadcastify captured the urgency of the rescue operation. Crews initially had no visual on either man. One responder radioed: "We're going to be in search for a down plane." Another confirmed an eyewitness on the ground: "I'm on scene with the reporting party. He stated he did see an aircraft crash."

A 911 call came in at 8:49 p.m., and first responders reached the men by 9:05 p.m., a sixteen-minute window during which the plane slipped beneath the surface and the two men were swimming in the dark. Dispatchers called for additional ambulances, another engine company, and mutual-aid boats staged at Bluegill Park, a nearby launch point on the lake.

After the plane went under, Boltz managed to call 911 from his phone before it, too, was lost to the water. Rescuers used thermal imaging and GPS coordinates from the submerged phone to narrow the search area. One dispatcher relayed the difficulty in real time:

"I was talking to the pilots. It sounds like they may plan to swim to the nearest shore after it went under, and then I lost contact with them. I believe his phone is underwater. They may be swimming south, I believe."

Tiffany said he and Boltz climbed on top of the sinking aircraft after escaping through the passenger-side door. They could see emergency lights onshore. Tiffany recalled telling the pilot, "Let's just stay right here until help can come." But the plane kept sinking, and they had no choice but to swim.

After covering roughly 100 to 150 feet, Tiffany reached water about five feet deep. He stopped and waited. Moments later, rescuers announced over the radio: "We have two victims in the water. We're just pulling them out now." Both men were confirmed alert and conscious. Everyone aboard had been accounted for.

Tiffany vows to return to the campaign trail Monday

The 68-year-old congressman made clear at his Sunday news conference that the crash would not knock him out of the governor's race. He canceled a planned trip to Washington, D.C., but said he would be back campaigning by Monday.

"This will not deter me in my efforts that I started a year ago to become the next governor of the state of Wisconsin."

Tiffany also struck a grateful tone, one that came through repeatedly during his remarks. "We are just really fortunate," he said. "We're really fortunate that God was looking after us last night." In a statement from the hospital shortly after the crash, he put it similarly: "God was watching over us tonight, and I am incredibly grateful to be here in the hospital with my wife, Chris, by my side. An experience like this reminds you just how precious life is," the New York Post reported.

House Speaker Mike Johnson posted on X celebrating the outcome: "Grateful to God no one was hurt in this accident and my good friend @TomTiffanyWI is safe and back on the trail!"

The well-wishes crossed party lines. David Crowley, the Democratic Milwaukee County Executive running against Tiffany in November, said he was grateful both Tiffany and the pilot survived and praised Boltz's actions. "I'm grateful to God that Congressman Tiffany and no one else was hurt in this horrifying incident, which could have been a tragedy if not for the heroism of the pilot," Crowley said. The bipartisan response stood in contrast to the sharp-elbowed dynamics that typically define competitive governor's races.

Wisconsin's governor's race now carries a dramatic backdrop

Tiffany launched his gubernatorial bid roughly a year ago. He represents Wisconsin's 7th Congressional District, a sprawling northern Wisconsin seat, and has positioned himself as a conservative standard-bearer in a state that remains one of the most closely contested in the country.

His opponent, Crowley, leads Milwaukee County, Wisconsin's most populous, and carries the Democratic banner into a race that will test whether the state's rightward shifts in recent cycles hold at the gubernatorial level. The contest is one of several high-profile Republican bids for governor drawing national attention this cycle.

The crash adds a personal dimension to a campaign that was already generating interest. Tiffany walked out of a hospital, stood before cameras with stitches above his eye, and told Wisconsin voters he would be back at it the next morning. That kind of moment tends to stick with voters, and it arrived without any political calculation at all.

Internal Republican party dynamics will shape the broader landscape Tiffany campaigns in, but for now, the story is simpler than politics. A plane went down. Two men got out. And one of them plans to keep running.

When the water is rising and the lights are far away, nobody cares about your party registration, they care whether you can swim. Tiffany swam, and he lived to campaign another day.