BC Missing Plane Found; All Aboard Dead

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Canoe

Tuesday, July 11, 2000

Missing plane found; all aboard dead

VICTORIA (CP) -- The wreckage of a light plane that disappeared Monday after leaving a remote B.C. lake was found Tuesday on a mountainside with its four American occupants dead.

The single-engine Piper Cherokee was spotted about 30 kilometres southwest of its departure point, a lodge on Chilko Lake, 225 kilometres north of Vancouver.

"Four people on board did not survive the impact," said Capt. Gabriel Ringuette of the Victoria Rescue Co-ordination Centre.

Family members identified the pilot as William Gildow, 74, of Gales Creek, Ore.

They said the others on board were Gildow's son Daniel, 42, of Scappoose, Ore., and his daughter Nancy Wicks, 49, and her husband Michael Wicks, 45, both of Eugene, Ore.

The family, on a fishing holiday, had stayed for three days at the Tsuniah Lake Lodge, said lodge manager Eric Brebner.

They left Chilko Lake on Monday morning en route to Friday Harbour, Wash., in the San Juan Islands, to clear customs on their way home.

The plane was reported missing after taking off from a high-altitude grass air strip. When it failed to radio its location, a massive search involving four military and five civilian aircraft was launched.

The crumpled wreckage, which showed signs of having burned, was spotted on the edge of the Homathko icefield, about 2,440 metres up, Ringuette said.

"There was snow and ice, as well as very rocky and vertical terrain," he said.

A Transportation Safety Board investigator, along with a coroner, were not expected to reach the crash site until Wednesday, said Ringuette, adding the plane appeared to have flown into the side of the mountain.

"Until he gets on scene, it's all just speculative," Ringuette said.

Weather can vary locally in the area, but the overall weather in the region was fine at the time the plane took off, said Ringuette.

A Labrador search and rescue helicopter was able to land close to the wreckage Tuesday. Rescue technicians climbed up to the crash site and confirmed none of the occupants had survived.

Three of the bodies were found inside the plane and another was just outside, said Ringuette. It was not clear when the bodies would be removed, he said.

Last month, three Oregon men were killed when their float plane crashed shortly after takeoff from Hotnarko Lake, east of Bella Coola, B.C.

-- Rachel Gibson (rgibson@hotmail.com), July 12, 2000


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