Authorities find two bodies
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Plane with Rainer Schaller on board disappeared off Costa Rica
Fitness entrepreneur Rainer Schaller (archive image).
Photo: dpa/Rolf Vennenbernd
San Jose A plane disappears from radar on a flight from Mexico to Costa Rica. The German fitness entrepreneur and Loveparade organizer Rainer Schaller was also on board with his partner and children. Emergency services discovered two dead, debris and pieces of luggage in the sea.
When searching for the missing private plane with five German passengers off the coast of Costa Rica, the emergency services discovered two dead. The bodies of an adult and a child were found in the sea, the television station Teletica reported on Saturday, citing the Ministry of Public Security. “There were five passengers and one pilot on the plane — a total of six people,” Civil Aviation Authority director Fernando Naranjo said. “Based on the dates of birth, two children were also among them.” Parts of the fuselage, seats and several pieces of luggage had previously been discovered around 28 kilometers from Limón airport.
Communication with the machine was broken around 6 p.m. (local time) – early Saturday morning at 2 a.m. German time – said Costa Rica’s Ministry of Public Security on Facebook. The plane was therefore on its way from Mexico to Puerto Limón on the Caribbean coast of the Central American country. The pilot is said to have been Swiss. Investigations had been initiated together with neighboring countries, it said.
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10 images Plane crash off Costa Rica – wreckage and luggage pulled out of the sea
Photo: AFP/EZEQUIEL BECERRA
“The plane disappeared from radar about 25 miles from Limón airport. The plane was supposed to land at 6:58 p.m., we lost it at an altitude of 2,000 feet,” Civil Aviation Authority Director Fernando Naranjo told Teletica.
Parts of the fuselage, seats and several pieces of luggage had previously been discovered around 28 kilometers from Limon Airport. “About 28 kilometers from Limón Airport, we found remains in the sea that appear to belong to the plane,” said Coast Guard Chief Martín Arias. A video made available to local media by the Ministry of Security showed, among other things, several backpacks and travel bags.
Due to unfavorable weather conditions, the search work was initially stopped during the night. Later, the coast guard and the authority for airspace surveillance resumed the search. A command center was set up at Limón airport to coordinate the search work.
“There were five German passengers on the plane,” Public Security Minister Jorge Torres said in a video released by Teletica TV. Contact with the machine was lost near the village of Barra del Parismina.
According to information from “picture on sunday“McFit” founder Rainer Schaller (53), his girlfriend Christiane Schikorsky and her children Aaron and Finja and a man named Marcus Kurreck were on board. Jeanine Minaty, spokeswoman for the “McFit” operator RSG-Group GmbH, confirmed when asked by “BamS” that Schaller, his partner and their children were in the machine.
“We are aware of the case,” said the Foreign Office in Berlin. “Our embassy in San Jose is in contact with the local authorities to clarify the matter.”
However, Schaller has not only become known to a broad public through his fitness company. He was also head of the Lopavent company, which organized the Love Parade from 2006 to 2010. In 2010, the Loveparade in Duisburg was catastrophic, in which 21 people lost their lives in the crush and hundreds were injured and traumatized.
According to media reports, the missing plane was a Piaggio P.180 Avanti business jet. She started in Palenque in the Mexican state of Chiapas in the afternoon. The local ruined city of the Mayas is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the most important archaeological sites in Mexico.