Lake Amphibian Down off Puerto Plata?

Abuela

Bronze
May 13, 2006
1,952
288
83
I believe this is the owner of Monkey Jungle. Hope everyone has survived and will be ok.
 

AlterEgo

Administrator
Staff member
Jan 9, 2009
23,097
6,247
113
South Coast
El Nacional has an article identifying the owners and their passenger, a Canadian. *Presumably families have been notified*
 

Cdn_Gringo

Gold
Apr 29, 2014
8,671
1,133
113
The Canadian works for an NGO with an office in Sosua/Cabarete. Manages several housing related projects here in the DR and Haiti.*
 

AlterEgo

Administrator
Staff member
Jan 9, 2009
23,097
6,247
113
South Coast
Article translated:

Posted on:
October 18, 2016
By:
the National
e-mail:
wording [@] elnacional.com.do
Previous
By:
Enrique Vargas
and Diogenes Tejada
enriquevargas1956@hotmail.com


Puerto Plata.

Authorities recovered the Tuesday morning of the fuselage of the plane last night had been reported missing in the Atlantic Ocean while returning from Haiti to the General International Airport Gregorio Luperon.

According to data obtained by this means the ship was owned by US citizen based in Sos?a Charles A. Ritzen.
in the plane were traveling as occupants American businessman Charles A. Ritzen, owner fairground Monkey Jungle in Sos?a, his wife Candy Ritzen and Canadian Benjamin Brown.

Members of the Air Force, Navy Dominican and Civil Defense comb the area in search of other remains of the aircraft, an amphibious model American enrollment, for which they use a helicopter and several divers.
the head of the Regional Directorate North of the national police general Brigadier Caesar Augusto Sena Rojas, said that currently is only found part of the ship.

the Dominican Civil Aviation Institute reported that the aircraft was spotted last four miles from Puerto Plata from where communication was lost at dusk on Monday.

An intensive search by air, sea and land carried out by the authorities of the small plane that disappeared last night with three people on board heading from Port Au Prince, Haiti, Gregorio Luperon International Airport.
the Dominican Civil Aviation Institute (IDAC) after confirming the disappearance of enrollment N-724ST aircraft, he reported that after seven Monday night was the last time the control tower contacted the crew of the aircraft, four miles from the airport terminal.

indicates the institution that organisms have returned never to know the whereabouts of the plane, which is said to have up to seven people, including the pilot.

from six o'clock today, aircraft of the Dominican Air Force and Coast Guard of the Dominican Navy, display an intense search for the plane. Also by land, dozens of units of the Civil Defense, Dominican Red Cross and 911 seek it .

"All agencies are working hard in search of the aircraft and its occupants, as soon as the information of his disappearance he coming Puerto Plata , "said the Dominican Civil Aviation Institute (IDAC), in his statements to the media.

http://elnacional.com.do/hallan-fuselaje-de-avioneta-desaparecio/
 
May 5, 2007
9,246
92
0
I saw this on DT: Part of plane missing near Puerto Plata found in water (Update2)

Rather unusual for an amphib to crash over water.

Does anyone have additional insight to this crash and the people involved?

The Lake is a weird plane I got a 20 minute ride in one and thought I might never hear or regain feeling in my arse from noise and vibration They apparently have a tendency to want to go nose up so if it was trimmed for landing in any kind of seas it may well have made a a tail hit Reading around the net I found they like to porpoise and have a tendency to take on water throwing the CG way off, apparently a rather dangerous little critter I prefer the DC 3 on Skis they have in Greenville Maine, had a"ground" tour an it would be great to do a takeoff in that monster, I've seen it and the rooster tails are like a couple racing hydroplanes and the noise from those big recips trying to get on step is tremendous
 

the gorgon

Platinum
Sep 16, 2010
33,997
83
0
The Lake is a weird plane I got a 20 minute ride in one and thought I might never hear or regain feeling in my arse from noise and vibration They apparently have a tendency to want to go nose up so if it was trimmed for landing in any kind of seas it may well have made a a tail hit Reading around the net I found they like to porpoise and have a tendency to take on water throwing the CG way off, apparently a rather dangerous little critter I prefer the DC 3 on Skis they have in Greenville Maine, had a"ground" tour an it would be great to do a takeoff in that monster, I've seen it and the rooster tails are like a couple racing hydroplanes and the noise from those big recips trying to get on step is tremendous

i just love it when ID brings the box of knowledge to the proceedings..
 

cobraboy

Pro-Bono Demolition Hobbyist
Jul 24, 2004
40,964
936
113
The Lake is a weird plane I got a 20 minute ride in one and thought I might never hear or regain feeling in my arse from noise and vibration They apparently have a tendency to want to go nose up so if it was trimmed for landing in any kind of seas it may well have made a a tail hit Reading around the net I found they like to porpoise and have a tendency to take on water throwing the CG way off, apparently a rather dangerous little critter I prefer the DC 3 on Skis they have in Greenville Maine, had a"ground" tour an it would be great to do a takeoff in that monster, I've seen it and the rooster tails are like a couple racing hydroplanes and the noise from those big recips trying to get on step is tremendous
I had a house on a lake in TN, a lot of open water, and kicked the tires on a couple of Lakes based at Jones in Lake Dora. I thought they were slow and sluggish, not impressed enough to want to go from C182S to a Lake or get a seaplane rating.

They were loud with the motor on top of your head.

Having had an interest in Lakes is what brought the article to my attention.

A Lake can't fly seven people.
 

cobraboy

Pro-Bono Demolition Hobbyist
Jul 24, 2004
40,964
936
113
Sounds like they got caught in convective activity close to home, "an electrical storm and downpours." Not good. Small planes and convection don't mix.

"Part of the fuselage" floating is usually a piece of the tail section with an air pocket.

Article says the last contact was at 7pm. It's dark by then, and they were flying in convective activity?

Grace to their grieving families...
 

beeza

Silver
Nov 2, 2006
3,480
732
113
I flew with Chuck several times in his Renegade. *It's a bitch to fly, it fights you at every turn. *One characteristic that made me feel very uneasy, was how the nose would tend to pitch up when you throttled back, then it would proceed to fall out of the sky.

Chuck described it as aerodynamic as a house brick, but he flew his plane very well. *He had mastered water landings on some of the larger lakes in the DR and was starting to look for suitable ocean landing spots. *He bought the plane to go treasure hunting. *He kept telling me that one day we were going to Hogstye Reef to dive a wreck there, supposedly laden with treasure.

But he also used his plane for his charitable work. *He went to Haiti many times taking medicines and supplies to the poverty stricken Haitian communities and aide agencies. *And yesterday was an opportunity to go to the hurricane hit region of Western Haiti where help is desperately needed.

But their day didn't start well for Chuck and his crew, due to the fact of an administrative error on their flight plan to Haiti. *The error was a simple incorrect digit on their tail number. *Before their taxi out, the tower was not able to clear their flight plan because of this error. *Even though Chuck pleaded with the tower to correct the simple mistake themselves, the tower was unable to comply, which meant that he had to go back all the way through the airport and submit another flight plan. *This delayed their scheduled departure by an hour.

Perhaps if this simple one digit error hadn't come into play, they might have bee able to return to POP earlier and avoided that deadly storm that was hanging over POP at 7pm.

At 7.22pm I received a phone call from POP tower. *The duty controller knew that Chuck and I were friends and proceeded to tell me that they lost contact after he had reported 4 miles from the station with the field in sight. *His next report was to call on final for runway 08. *That call never came and the alert was raised soon after.

Our initial thoughts were that he had seen the bad weather over the runway and decided to abort the landing and look for an alternative, such as Santiago or Samana. *However he never changed frequency and checked in with Santo Domingo control center. *He phone wasn't ringing, so I tried to see if I could contact Candy. *At that time I wasn't aware that she was with him. *I was able to contact a mutual friend and we went to their house, only to be told by the security staff that Candy was with him.

We started to get worried and decide to start our own search based on the information given to me by the tower and by then I was in contact with a senior IDAC officer. *We used our 4x4s and headed down to playa Bergantin through the cane fields of Montellano. *At the abandoned school we met two military security staff charged with patrolling this area. *We asked them if they had heard any low planes lately and he surprisingly told us that he actually saw a plane go right over his head and then made a sharp turn out to sea.*

We were then joined by the army, airforce, defensa civil and the fire brigade at playa Cangrejo. *By 2am we abandoned our land search and opted for an aerial search at first light.

We were the first plane airborne at 10 minutes after sunrise. *We spent an hour in the air, concentrating our search over the land. *Then the air force helicopter arrived and we were ordered to land. *They concentrated their search over the coastline and reported that they saw what looked like a piece of tail section drifting near Ocean World. *But they were unable to hover as they were too heavy, so they made their way back to the base to offload some personnel and take on some fuel.

The IDAC officer asked us to get back in the air and resume where the chopper had found some wreckage. *Our departure took us out over the sea and when we were just North of Playa Dorada, we spotted a piece of wing floating in the water. *By that time I knew our job was done. *I got up in the air this morning with the faint hope that I would see a seaplane bobbing up and down on the water with soaked electronics and a very weary crew. *We would get back on terra firma and he would be jibing at me in his sarcastic tone that I took my time.

But instead I'm sat here writing this with a heavy heart, knowing I have lost a friend.

The North Coast will dearly miss the kind souls of these wonderful people that were taken from us far too early.
 

dulce

Silver
Jan 1, 2002
2,524
211
63
Bezza
So sorry for the loss of your dear friends. May they rest in eternal peace.