A pilot is fighting to recover his 1946 Stinson 108-1 following an emergency landing over Red Lake Nation tribal territory in northern Minnesota last month. The incident has drawn attention to a decades-old tribal resolution the tribe says established a 20,000-foot minimum altitude over Red Lake lands and renewed questions about who controls the airspace above tribal territories.

Pilot Darrin Smedsmo was en route to Bemidji Regional Airport for flight training on Oct. 15 when his engine failed over Lower Red Lake at about 3,500 feet. Smedsmo was forced to glide toward Minnesota Highway 1 on the reservation’s western edge. He landed safely, uninjured, with the aircraft largely undamaged.

“I was over the lake by maybe half a mile, and when I looked up, my prop was stopped in front of me, a

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