NOTRE-DAME-DU-MONT-CARMEL, Quebec — Officials destroyed a 1,000-feet television tower to bring down the body of a pilot and his plane still stuck atop it.
The body of Gilbert Paquette, 38, had been suspended since Sunday when he crashed his Cessna, fusing it to the tower. The body quickly recovered from the wreckage and taken to a funeral home after the needle-like tower collapsed on Friday.
Hundreds of people watched as the seven support wires holding the tower up were cut by an explosion, causing the tower to fold onto itself and fall almost in place.
The tower suffered significant structural damage, making it unsafe for anyone to attempt to recover the body.
“We were left with one solution, the tower was too dangerous so it would have to be collapsed to avoid the inherent risks involved and to remove the body,” said Jean-Francois Lebrun, a spokesman for WesTower, the company that owns the tower.
