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Community reeling in the wake of N.W.T. plane crash tragedy

‘You’re not impartial, there’s an intimacy; your children played together or you knew them’
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Canadian Ranger Sergeant Gordon Rothnie was one of the first ones on the scene where six people were killed in a plane crash in Fort Smith, Northwest Territories, on Thursday January 25, 2024.THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jason Franson

A mayor overcome with emotion. A rescuer struggling with the sight of a deadly plane crash. Church bells ringing for every life lost.

The fallout from disaster that killed six people and left one in hospital continued to reverberate in Fort Smith, a town of some 2,200 on the Northwest Territories’ boundary with Alberta where everyone knows everyone.

Sgt. Gordon Rothnie, a Canadian Army ranger who rushed to the crash site by snowmobile along with four colleagues in a rescue attempt, said he was hoping for the best.

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