One dead, four missing after plane vanishes off Vancouver Island

VICTORIA, B.C. — At least one man is dead and four others are missing following the disappearance of a float plane on a flight between Vancouver Island and the British Columbia mainland, authorities said.

A hiker found the unidentified man's body on a beach on Quadra Island, about 15 minutes from Campbell River, the Vancouver Island town from which the de Havilland Beaver owned by MJM Air took off Monday for a logging camp on Knight Inlet.

Two hundred personnel and several aircraft from Canadian Forces Base Comox have been assigned to the search, and Air Force Capt. Cheryl Robinson said yesterday that authorities had not given up hope for the other four occupants of the plane.

"The search area is much smaller now, of course, tragically because of the fact that we found this body, but the search is now concentrated in that location," Robinson said.

There was no sign of wreckage nor any report of a distress call, she added.

Two of the passengers were Doug Decock, 38, and his brother Trevor Decock, 34, both of Campbell River, contract employees for G.W. Cox and Sons, said Doug Decock's wife Allison, 31, adding that her husband has survived a few previous accidents.

"All I can do is hope," she said. "I have faith he'll come home," she said.

Another passenger was described as a contract employee who was on his way to an International Forest Products logging camp at Frances Bay.