Family mourns ‘role model’ pilot
A West Coast family and community are mourning the loss of their ‘‘action man’’, presumed dead after crashing his light plane in the Southern Alps.
Well-known West Coast man Tim Gibb crashed his light plane near Mt Nicholson on Thursday.
Gibb left Franz Josef about 9am on Thursday, destined for Rangiora. No-one else was in the plane.
The downed plane was found by a rescue helicopter on Thursday afternoon, but plans to get to it were put on hold due to bad weather.
His daughter, Sarah Gibb, said it was all ‘‘very surreal’’.
She was at sea on a boat in Makarska, Croatia, when she received the news her dad had been in the crash.
‘‘I went into shock and felt like I had detached from my body, words were coming out of my mouth, but they didn’t feel like my own,’’ she said.
Tim Gibb famously brought in equipment to ferry cars and people across the Waiho River when the bridge was washed away in 2019.
He ferried up to 30 cars and 100 people a day across the river using a 38-tonne dump truck.
Sarah Gibb tried for three days to get flights home after receiving the news of her father’s death.
‘‘I had to wait for [the boat] to dock then bus to Split, found a flight to Paris with a 24-hour layover and then going home via India and Australia,’’ she said.
‘‘My flights have been cancelled multiple times, one set of flights went from $10,000 to $21,000 as I was halfway through booking them.’’
The 27-year-old finally found some flights through India.
‘‘It’s been so stressful trying to find tickets to get home, especially with limited wi-fi, it’s taken all of my energy ... I won’t process it properly until I get home to my friends and family.’’
She described her dad as humble, hardworking, patient and kind.
‘‘[He was] the greatest role model a child could ask for. I am so grateful and lucky that I got to call [him] my father and I will always cherish the years we had.’’