Photo/DAN PELTON SHELBURNE PLANE CRASH: OPP and Transportation Safety Board investigators probe the wreckage of a Cessna 172 that crashed in Melancthon early Monday and sent three men to hospital. Labour Day 2008 will be one that Liz Carruthers will have trouble forgetting. She was out on her deck in Melancthon township at about 6 a.m. Monday when she heard human cries: "Help me! Someone help me!"

She called to her husband, Wayne Robson, and the couple jumped into their truck and headed down 270 summer sideroad in the direction of the voice. They could hear the call for help, but fog inhibited their view.

They pulled into a hayfield at the back of the Maffra family farm and spotted a man clutching his stomach and waving his arms. What they saw through the fog, beside him, impressed them as nothing more than broken deck umbrellas.

"Are you ok?" they called. "Our plane crashed!" he cried back.

It was then, that the realization of what they were seeing struck them. They were looking at the mangled wreckage of a small aircraft that had been carrying three men. Wayne Robson raced to call 911 and "within literally minutes" said Liz, "a helicopter appeared."

Dufferin OPP report that at 4:50 a.m., Orangeville 911 Dispatch received a call from the plane's pilot that they had crashed somewhere between Brampton and Collingwood. As a result, a massive search involving several OPP detachments, police and ambulance services, airports and fire departments began. When Wayne Robson's 911 call went out, they knew where to find them.

The plane, which was literally torn apart, and at press time the cause of the crash was not determined.

Liz Carruthers said the pilot still lay amongst the wreckage when they arrived on scene, and the passengers were in shock. The young flyers had left the Brampton Flying Club in Caledon. Constable Evan Tripp of Dufferin OPP said his department could not comment on the crash, as it was in the "assessment stage" and "in the hands of the federal Transportation Safety Board."

The Board was on site investigating the crash all day Monday. Representative Ray Simpson said that there were always three factors to investigate: "Man, machine, and environment." The initial on-site investigation is completed and perishable evidence has been removed.

"Instruments have been removed and will be examined in the lab," he said. "The next step is to identify any underlying deficiencies that may have led to the occurrence and make recommendations for corrections. At this point, we are assessing, and have not spoken to the crew. We will know more when the men are well enough to be interviewed."