Irish person killed as skydivers' plane crashes into lake

Two British tourists and one from Ireland were among five skydivers killed when a plane crashed into a lake in eastern Australia shortly after take-off, police said today.

The single-engine Cessna 206 smashed into a small reservoir yesterday. Two passengers, including the owner of the skydiving club that operated the plane, survived and are recovering in hospital.

“The aircraft is going to be retrieved from the lake,” Alan Stray of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau said. “Then the work will start on analysing and examining the wreckage.”

Police inspector Noel Powers told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that two of the dead were British and one was Irish. The others on board were Australian. The victims’ identities were not immediately released.

The Cessna was carrying six parachutists and a pilot when it smashed into a reservoir near Ipswich, about 45 miles east of the Queensland state capital, Brisbane.

The crash left the plane submerged upside down in the water about 1,600 feet from its take-off point with four bodies trapped inside. The bodies were recovered Monday night.

Powers said witnesses saw a plume of smoke from the back of the plane before it clipped a tree and crashed into the reservoir, adding that the plane appeared to have “had difficulty gaining height”.

Stray said the plane was fitted with a powerful engine to allow it to climb quickly after take-off.

“Its rate of climb was outstanding,” he said, adding that a malfunction that prevented it gaining altitude showed that “something radically has gone wrong (and) we have to look at the engine power side of things”.

He said a witness report of a puff of smoke coming from the plane, “gives us some clues as to where we have to look. We will be taking the engine away for analysis”.

The plane was operated by the Brisbane Skydiving Centre, which according to its website offers training courses and tandem skydives.