Canadian aid worker missing in plane crash
Haldimand County resident one of three on flight from Haiti to Dominican Republic
A humanitarian worker from Haldimand County is among three people missing after a small plane crashed off the north coast of the Dominican Republic.
Humanitarian organization Live Different, which is based in Hamilton, says longtime employee Benjamin Cole Brown was on board the aircraft with two Americans at the time of the crash Monday around 7 p.m.
The three were returning from Haiti where they had delivered donations and other aid to help local residents rebuild from Hurricane Matthew, which recently devastated parts of the Caribbean.
Brown, 36, was Live Different’s manager of operations for the Dominican Republic and Haiti, and had lived abroad for nearly a decade.
Live Different spokesperson Jennifer Digiandomenico said organization staff are at the crash site awaiting word on the search for survivors.
She said employees are holding out hope that the man they referred to simply as Cole is still alive.
“We love Cole so much,” she said in a telephone interview. “He is a big part of the Live Different family, which extends all across Canada and the Dominican Republic and Haiti. We have received so many phone calls and emails from people in all three countries who are still praying and thinking of Cole.” Digiandomenico said Brown boarded the plane with Chuck and Candy Ritzen, an American couple also involved in the humanitarian aid field, as the three prepared to return to the Dominican Republic. They had dropped off medical supplies in Port-au-Prince for victims of Hurricane Matthew, she added.
“It was reported there was heavy rain and a storm near Puerto Plata (where the plane was headed),” she said.
The plane, she said, was Chuck Ritzen’s personal aircraft that was frequently used for travel between the two countries.
A spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada said they were informed that a Canadian citizen was missing off the coast of the Dominican Republic.
“Debris from a small aircraft has been recovered near Puerto Plata and consular officials at the consulate of Canada in Puerto Plata Consular are in contact with local authorities to gather additional information,” Austin Jean wrote in an email to The Canadian Press.
The Dominican air force had located wreckage from the plane.
The single-engine Lake LA-250 apparently lost contact with the control tower shortly after 6 p.m. when it was about six kilometres from the town.
Digiandomenico confirmed that investigators had recovered some debris from the aircraft and said helicopters were flying over the area searching for the passengers.
She said Brown, who had worked for Live Different for 13 years, grew up in the small Ontario community of York (on the Grand River between Caledonia and Cayuga) and went to high school in the area.
Brown is single and has no children, but his family still lives in York, Digiandomenico said.
Brown spent the past10 years living at various international sites and eventually rose through the ranks to become the manager of operations in the two islands, she said.
At all times, Digiandomenico said he was driven by his passion for social justice.
“His life was his work,” she said. “He’s a super influential person. He’s an amazing speaker.” With files from the Hamilton Spectator’s Carmela Fragomeni