Laos plane crash 'devastates' NSW family

An aid worker who spent two decades helping people around the globe has been described as one of the world's best men after he and his father were among six Australians killed in a plane crash in Laos.
 
An entire Sydney family was also among the 44 passengers and five crew killed when Lao Airlines flight QV301 crashed into the Mekong River trying to land at Pakse airport in what the airline called extreme weather on Wednesday afternoon.
Michael Creighton had been working in Laos for almost a year as an operations manager for Norwegian People's Aid's mine action program, and his father Gordon was visiting him to experience his son's humanitarian work.
Sydney tax agent Gavin Rhodes, 39, his wife Phoumalaysy (Lea) Rhodes, 35, and their children 17-month-old Manfred Rhodes and three-year-old Jadesuda Rhodes also perished in the crash.
A Rhodes family representative issued a statement asking the media to "respect their privacy at this difficult time".
The Creighton family said it had "lost a father, a husband, a son, a brother, a fiance and a best mate in one tragic circumstance".
"We're trying to come to terms with our loss. We request privacy to grieve at this devastating time," the family said in a statement.
Michael Creighton's ex-wife, former Tasmanian MP Kathryn Hay, said the world had lost one of its best men.
"He travelled the world, assisting people in so many ways. He was so intelligent and dedicated to work," she told the ABC.
Michael, 42, grew up in Glen Innes in northern NSW before joining the Australian army and then the United Nations.
He spent the past 20 years working on aid projects around the world, including in Afghanistan, Iraq, Switzerland, Cambodia and Africa, mostly in landmine clearance, and had been living in the Laotian capital Vientiane with his fiancee, Melanie.
Retired schoolteacher Gordon Creighton, 71, was a prominent member of the Glen Innes community and served as president of the Glen Innes Magpies Rugby League Club.
Howard Whan, the club's current president, said the town was shattered on hearing the news.
"He (Gordon Creighton) was one of those bloke when anything was need in the community he was there," Mr Whan told AAP.
"He's been teaching football skills for about 30 years and there's a huge respect in the town for him.
"It's going to take a lot of replacing someone like that ... the mood's very sombre, everyone is just shattered."
Witnesses reported horrendous scenes at an emergency centre set up in a temple in Pakse.
"I saw lifeless bodies laying about and other lifeless bodies being brought in, some connected to IV drips," a foreign resident told the Bangkok Post.
"It's absolute horror."
The Department of Foreign Affairs says consular officials are travelling to Pakse on Thursday, and that recovery and identification efforts will "recommence at first light".
Identification and recovery may take some time, DFAT says.
Lao Airlines flies an ATR-72 twin-engine turboprop plane on the 467km route from Vientiane to Pakse, and is understood not to have taken part in an International Air Transport Association (IATA) safety audit.
The Lao Aviation Authority said strong winds hit the small aircraft as it approached Pakse airport.
French-Italian aircraft manufacturer ATR said the plane was new and had been delivered in March.
An unconfirmed passenger list shows more than half of the people aboard were foreign nationals, including from France, South Korea, the US, China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Canada and Malaysia. Some 17 people were listed as Laos nationals.
"So far eight bodies have been found. We don't yet know their nationalities," said Yakao Lopangkao, director-general of Lao's Department of Civil Aviation.
"We haven't found the plane yet. It is underwater. We're trying to use divers to locate it."
Some bodies were found as far as 20 kilometres from the crash site, he said.
Some of the bodies were taken to a mortuary at a Chinese temple in Pakse, AFP reported.
Three bodies draped in blue plastic sheets were seen in the building, which was guarded by about 10 policemen, some armed, who turned away onlookers.
"They are foreigners from the crash," staff at the centre said, adding that their nationalities were unknown.