Alaska floatplane collision death toll rises to 6, including 1 Canadian

One Canadian was among the six peoplekilled in the mid-air collisionof two sightseeing planes over open water in Alaska on Monday.

Alaska State Troopers named the Canadian as Elsa Wilk, a 37-year-oldfrom Richmond, B.C. Her next of kin has been notified, policesaid in an email.

Her husband Ryan Wilk, 39, from Utah, was also named as one of the dead.

"Our thoughts and sympathies are with the family and loved ones of the Canadian citizen who died in Alaska,"Guillaume Brub, a spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada, said in a statement earlier Tuesday.

"Canadian consular officials in Seattle are in contact with local authorities to gather additional information and stand ready to provide consular assistance as required," he said.

The U.S. Coast Guard confirmed in an email Tuesday evening that two people who werelisted as missing had been found dead, making a total of six fatalities among the 16 people aboard the two planes.

The other 10 were injured.Four were later transferred to hospital in Seattle, suffering various broken bones.

"This is definitely a difficult case for all involved, and at least there can be some sense of closure for the families and friends of the victims,"Chief Petty Officer Matthew Schofield wrote.

Along with the Wilks, Alaska State Troopers also named the four other victims:

• Simon Bodie, 56,Tempe, New South Wales, Australia.
• Louis Botha, 46, San Diego, Calif.
• Randy Sullivan, 46, Ketchikan, Alaska.
• Cassandra Webb, 62, St. Louis, Mo.

Of the 16 on the two planes, there were 14 passengers and twopilots. Officials with the U.S. Coast Guard say they were 14 Americans, one Canadian and one Australian.

Alaska State Troopers said they notified the Canadian and Australian Consulates about the crash.

Planes were heading to Ketchikan

U.S. federal investigators who were in Alaska on Tuesday to try to find out why the planescollidedrevealed some preliminary findings.

One of the aircraft was a de Havilland DHC-2 Beaver with five people aboard, and the other a de Havilland Otter DHC-3 carrying 11, Federal Aviation Administration spokespersonAllen Kenitzer said.

The Ketchikan-based operator of the Otter, Taquan Air, said its pilot and nine of the 10 passengers were rescued and receiving medical attention. One person aboard died.

That group was returning from a sightseeing tour of Misty Fjords when the crash occurred, Taquan said.

All five people aboard theBeaverdied.

Jennifer Homendy, a member of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board, identified Mountain Air Service as the owner of the smaller plane. CBC News phoned the company Tuesday evening but no one answered.

Homendysaid early indications were that both planes were heading back to Ketchikanwhen they collided at approximately 975 to 1,000 metres in altitude. The Taquan plane, she added, appeared to be descending.

Neither of the single-engine planes was under air traffic control when they collided, Kenitzer said.

Homnedy said the NTSBwould look at many possible factors during its investigation, includingpilot training, medical issues, flight plans, aircraft maintenance, flight conditions, and weather.

She added that neither plane hadcockpit voice recorders or flight data recorders and neither was required to have them.

The water temperature off Ketchikan on Tuesday was 9 C, according to the National Weather Service. Expected survival time in 4 to 10 Cwater is one to three hours, according to the United States Search and Rescue Task Force website.

Tuesday's search for the two missing passengers, who were later confirmed to be among the dead, involved a coast guard helicopter, a flotilla of boats, and teams from the U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Ketchikan Fire Department and other rescue units, Schofield said.

'Deeply saddened': cruise operator

All 14 passengers on both floatplanes were from the cruise ship Royal Princess, which was on a seven-day trip from Vancouver to Anchorage and operated by Princess Cruises.

Princess Cruises issued a statement saying it was "deeply saddenedto report this news, and our thoughts and prayers are with those who lost their lives and the families of those impacted by today's accident."

Betty Hill, a passenger currently on the Royal Princess from California, said the news was announced to cruise passengersaround 6:30 p.m. Monday.

"The room turned completely silent. The response was somber. It was a very sad day," Hill said."My hopes and prayers that they find the missing person[s] and the injured make a speedy and complete recovery."

Princess Cruises says the shipdeparted Ketchikan approximately 3.5 hours late and was scheduled to arrive in Juneau at approximately 9a.m.

The crash site, at Coon Cove about 480 kilometressouth of Alaska's capital Juneau, lies near a tourist lodge that runs excursions to the nearby Misty Fjords National Monument.

Community rattled

Mayor David Landisof the KetchikanGateway Borough the local county-equivalent authority offeredcondolences to the families of the victims and thanked first responders.

"This tragedy has touched many of us significantly," Landissaid.

The local tourism authority said that in 2018 alone, over 1.1 million people visited thetown, providing critical economic lifeblood.

"We've had a variety of industries in this community, starting with mining, then salmon canning then timber. They've all gone by the wayside," resident Dave Kiffer said."Tourism's crucial."

Kiffer, a former float plane pilot himself, guessed about 20 per cent of those tourists visitMisty Fjords andfloatplane flightslet themtake it all in.

He said the floatplane industry has focused on safetyin recent decades, progress that makesthis incident even more shocking. His concern is this calamity will have tourists questioning the industry's progress.

"It's not like the old days when I flew many years ago. As a pilot, you might be flying into a cloud bank with a plastic map on your chest and you're kinda looking around and you have no idea," he said.

"The reality is dozens of planes fly out there every day and something like this almost never happens anymore."

He paused a beat after uttering those words.

"Obviously, it happened two days ago."