Victims of Lake Erie plane crash remain inside craft, officials say

KINGSVILLE, Ontario (AP) -- Police divers used video cameras Wednesday to determine that all the victims remain inside Georgian Express Flight 126 at the bottom of Lake Erie, about a mile off Pelee Island.
"It is our opinion, given the vantage point of the divers, that all 10 passengers remain onboard the plane," provincial police incident commander Doug Babbitt said. "This will be confirmed later by the coroner on the ship."
There have been no moves to recover the victims or the downed Cessna Caravan, which crashed shortly after taking off from Pelee Island in a snowstorm Jan. 17 with members of a hunting party. It was bound for Windsor, Ontario, and crashed about 20 miles north of Sandusky, Ohio.
Divers had not entered the craft, Babbitt said Wednesday afternoon, but had sent video cameras into the plane. Regional Coroner Dr. Tom Wilson will decide, perhaps as early as today, how to remove the bodies.
A Canadian Coast Guard helicopter shuttled personnel and equipment Wednesday to the coast guard cutter Samuel Risley.
An additional Transportation Safety Board member has joined the recovery operation aboard the ship as has a representative from Cessna to provide technical details about the craft and how best to retrieve it.
The eight-passenger Caravan weighs about 5,000 pounds when empty and has a maximum flight weight of 8,400 pounds, which the crane aboard the Samuel Risley can easily accommodate, said Coast Guard Capt. Darryl Clow.
While the plane is largely intact, investigators still cannot see the left wing well enough to determine its condition.
"The fuselage is more or less in one piece with the right wing attached," said Transportation Safety Board chief inspector Denis Rivard.