Yellowknife (Jan 10/07) - Investigators and a grieving community are dealing with the aftermath of a plane crash that killed three people near Yellowknife last week.

Albert Doctor, 41, of Ndilo, Pat Alexander, 53, of Eckville, Alta., and pilot Jason Watt, 36, of Trenton, Ont., died last Wednesday when the 185 Cessna they were in went down on its way to a recreational lodge southeast of Yellowknife.

Alfred Tsetta, who has been described as "lucky" by RCMP for escaping with only broken bones, has been in an Edmonton hospital since late last Thursday.

Search planes were called out after Arctic Sunwest Charters, the company that owned the plane, reported the aircraft missing Wednesday afternoon. It was located around 11 a.m. Thursday by search and rescue personnel.

Damage to the plane was described as "substantial," according to Jon Lee.

Lee, western regional manager of the federal Transportation Safety Board (TSB), was on scene in Yellowknife Thursday to Sunday. The plane is missing its right wing, he said, and suffering damage to the fuselage, making it "distorted."

"It wasn't its normal shape, but not totally destroyed," he said.

He described the plane's cabin, where passengers sit, as "broken up."

The coroner's office and the TSB are heading up the investigation into the cause of the crash.

Examination of evidence is still in the early stages, said Lee, but they are preparing to send one cockpit instrument to Ottawa to be scrutinized. It is a GPS (Global Positioning System) device that they hope will be able to show the path the plane took to its eventual demise.

The investigation will also look into why the aircraft's emergency locator beacon did not activate.

The damaged plane is in an enclosed trailer right now, said John Cottreau, another TSB spokesperson. The wreckage will be transported to Edmonton soon for further examination, he said.

The remains of the deceased are also in Edmonton, and were expected to undergo autopsy Monday or Tuesday, said NWT chief coroner Percy Kinney.

The autopsy will confirm the cause of death, he said, "whether it's injuries, exposure (to the cold), or both."

It had not been confirmed by the coroner's office as of press deadline whether any of the men were alive when the plane landed, Kinney said.

MCpl Shawn Harrison, one of the two rescuers who parachuted onto the scene, said that his initial suspicion was that the three men died on impact.

"I had suspicions they had died, which eventually turned up being not entirely true," said Harrison, in reaction to the CBC report that some of the deceased may have survived the initial crash. "But I suspect it was probably fairly quick... the fact that the seatbelts were all done up."

Ndilo, a small community connected to Yellowknife, is reeling from the loss of Albert Doctor, said Don Antoine, executive assistant at the Ndilo band office.

"The family's taking it pretty hard," he said. "Right now we're just trying to help and support them."

The band is helping arrange for family members in the South to come up and be with their Ndilo relatives, he said.

An interview will be conducted with Tsetta, the sole survivor, by investigators once his condition has stabilized, said Cottreau. The coroner's office has not interviewed Tsetta either, said Kinney, adding that they often leave that to the RCMP.

At this point, said Kinney, there is little conclusive evidence available. Right now everyone is working to gather more information, he said, "to shed a light on what happened."

-with files by Christine Grimard