John Driftmier
A reality TV show director working on an episode of Dangerous Flights has been killed in a plane crash in Kenya.
John Driftmier, a 30-year-old Calgary, Alberta native, died Sunday morning while filming aerial footage for an episode of a reality TV show that focuses on the work of pilots who risk their lives delivering small aircraft over vast expanses of land and ocean.
It’s with great sadness that we announce the accidental death of Director/Cameraman John Driftmier who was in Kenya filming @danger_flights
— Dangerous Flights (@Danger_Flights) February 25, 2013
Driftmier was in Kenya to wrap up filming on an episode of Dangerous Flights, and had hired a small plane to gather additional footage before returning to Canada on Monday. He and the plane’s pilot were both killed in the crash when their Aeroprakt A-22 aircraft slammed into Mt. Kenya.
Driftmier’s father-in-law, Les Allen, told the Toronto Sun that this latest job had the entire family on edge with worry.
They took a plane from Louisiana, a little single prop, up through North America and across the top of the Atlantic — Greenland, Iceland, Scotland — and then they made their way down through Europe to Africa.
Not only a director, Driftmier also worked as a cameraman and director of photography on a number of reality TV shows, including Highway Thru Hell, Licence to Drill and Ice Pilots NWT.
He leaves behind a wife in Ottawa, Ontario.
RIP John Driftmier. He packed more into just 30 years than most of us will in the lengthy timid lives we lead. bit.ly/Wf8pAL
— Maxwell May (@maxwellmay) February 26, 2013