Famed Canadian naturalist Charlie Russell is uninjured after he crash-landed his ultralight plane south of Atlin, B.C. on Thursday afternoon.

Famous for living with grizzly bears in Russia's Kamchatka area for 10 years, Russell believes humans and grizzlies can live peacefully alongside one another.

Russell was in Whitehorse last December as a guest speaker.

He was in the Yukon yesterday to begin another research project and visit friends over the summer, friend Murray Martin told the Star this morning.

Russell planned to fly from Telegraph Creek, B.C. to Atlin and then from Atlin to Whitehorse, but he stopped to refuel approximately 60 kilometres south of the B.C. community.

At 12:25 p.m., he was taking off to proceed on to Atlin when his aircraft was hit by a wind gust.

After regaining enough control to fly through some trees, Russell landed without injury, though his plane was damaged.

He then used a satellite phone to call a friend, who notified authorities of Russell's location.

Emergency Medical Services personnel went out with a helicopter and a search and rescue team and brought him back to Atlin.

"He had to be fortunate enough, or a very good pilot, to be able to walk out of something like that,” said Martin, who is an experienced pilot and the Star's outdoors columnist.

"The gusts off the water can be very dangerous.”

Russell built the two-seater plane himself approximately 10 years ago. He brought it with him to Russia, where it was seized by Russian military after he flew over a restricted zone in search of bears.

He lost the plane for about a year, but some friends were able to secure the aircraft back from Russian authorities and sent it back to Russell, who was living in Canada.

The plane was returned with a broken engine, which Russell just finished repairing about a month ago, said Martin.

Russell is the author of many publications, including the book Grizzly Heart: Living Without Feat Among the Brown Bears of Kamchatka and the DVD The Edge of Eden.

Many of the publications document Russell's time living with the bears.

"He actually raised young grizzlies,” said Martin. "In Russia, they get the young grizzlies as they're born and they put them in zoos, but when they get a year old or a bit older, they destroy them.”

Russell adopted many bears and built a relationship with them throughout his 10 years in Kamchatka.

"The bears rather adopted him as their own,” said Martin.

"He would go fishing, fly fishing, along the shore and the young bears would go with him.”

Martin said Russell is possibly the most famous person who has worked with grizzly bears.

"Yet he is so humble,” he said,

"It's an extra ordinary person who can live with the grizzlies.”

The RCMP want to remind people that if they're flying over the back country, be sure to be equipped with survival gear.