The small Irish skydiving community is in shock after learning of the death of an Irishman in a plane crash in Australia yesterday.
The parents of Nigel O'Gorman (34) from Naas, Co Kildare, are on their way to Australia to collect the remains of their son who was killed when the small plane he was in crashed 45 miles from Brisbane, Queensland.
His fiancee, Emma McCormack, also from Naas, was waiting for him at a drop zone 500 metres from the crash site.
"She was waiting there with Nigel's mobile phone and stuff. We can only imagine how upset she is," said Mr O'Gorman's cousin, Robert Grogan.
Mr O'Gorman emigrated with Ms McCormack five years ago to pursue his dream job as a skydiving instructor. "He was out to Australia parachuting and that was his life out there. . . . He lived for the sport and he loved Australia," Mr Grogan said.
He had learned to skydive with the Falcons Parachute Club in Co Carlow in the early 1990s. Its drop zone manager, PJ Lawlor, today said the small skydiving community in Ireland was in shock.
"He was a happy-go-lucky character, a nice guy who never did anybody any harm. He'd bend over backwards most of the time to help anybody out," he said.
"He was a builder and a cook and things like that, but he gave it up once he became a professional skydiver. It becomes a way of life. Once it gets into the blood, you're hooked," said Mr Lawlor.
He said that since the club had been notified of the accident yesterday morning, friends of Mr O'Gorman had been on the phone to him in tears. The jumping community is only around 200-300 people strong. We're all a fairly close-knit group of people."
Mr O'Gorman was among five people killed when the Cessna 206 light aircraft crashed shortly after takeoff. The plane clipped the topped of a tree and crashed into a dam near the Willowbank Aerodrome in Ipswich.
Two Britons and two Australians were also killed. The female instructor (27) and the owner (57) of the Brisbane Skydiving Centre, which operated the plane, survived the crash.
A plume of smoke was seen billowing from the aircraft before it crashed, but because there is no requirement for small planes in Australia to have flight recorders, investigators say it could take many months to establish the cause of the accident.
Agencies