4 dead in plane crash near St. Theresa Point

WINNIPEG — Four people died in a plane crash south of St. Theresa Point First Nation on Saturday night.

Two 50-year-old women and two men, aged 53 and 49, have died. The four were passengers in a bush plane flying from St. Theresa Point to Makepeace Lake in northern Manitoba. The pilot, a 20-year-old man, survived with serious but non-life-threatening injuries. There were no other survivors.

“It’s very devastating, very painful to have informed the families,” St. Theresa Point Chief Raymond Flett told the Free Press Sunday afternoon.

“I can’t seem to say the right words to be more comforting, but it’s devastating. Everybody’s still in shock.”

Flett said the deceased were two couples who were related to each other, and both families had young children.

“It’s our annual hunting season, and a lot of families go out to the land, it’s part of our culture, our way of life … that’s why they were out there,” Flett said.

The aircraft, a float-equipped DeHavilland DHC-2 (Beaver), went down about 40 kilometres south of St. Theresa Point at about 6:40 p.m. Saturday, a spokesperson for the Transportation Safety Board of Canada stated in an email.

The Transportation Safety Board was still gathering information about the crash on Sunday afternoon and hadn’t made a decision to deploy personnel to the scene, spokesperson Nic Defalco stated. No information has been released about the cause of the crash.

Island Lake RCMP officers chartered a helicopter to the crash site, and search and rescue personnel from the Canadian Forces Base at Trenton also went to the scene.

“The group did stay overnight, and then the extrication occurred this early this morning,” RCMP Sgt. Paul Manaigre said.

Manaigre said it was too early in the investigation to determine a cause, and that the RCMP would be awaiting the Transportation Safety Board’s report.

He called the incident “tragic.”

“(If they were) sustaining their cultural practices, and they died in the process … it’s going to be tough for quite a few people up there,” he said.

The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs gave its condolences in a social media post Sunday afternoon.

“We grieve with you. The loss of community members in such a sudden and devastating way is felt across all our Nations,” the post read. “In this time of heartbreak, we stand with St. Theresa Point, holding up the families and community in prayer, love, and strength.”

Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak said it would be “committed to standing with St. Theresa Point as the nation navigates the days ahead” in a social media post.

Seven people have died so far this year in Manitoba small-plane crashes.

On July 26, Peter Toth was killed when his privately registered Quad City Challenger II ultralight aircraft crashed in a field about 20 kilometres east of Winnipeg in the Rural Municipality of Springfield. Toth had recently received his pilot’s licence.

On July 8, two student pilots — Sreehari Sukesh and Savanna Royes — were killed in a mid-air collision near Steinbach. They had been flying a two-seat Cessna 152 and a four-seat Cessna 172 during training exercises with Harv’s Air flight school when they collided, crashing into private property south of Steinbach South Airport, west of Highway 12.

» Winnipeg Free Press