Richard Cousins

A high-profile British CEO and his family were among six people killed in a New Year’s Eve seaplane crash in Australia, police said on Monday. The plane went down Sunday in the Hawkesbury River near the suburb of Cowan some 50 kilometers north of Sydney, as New Year’s revelers on the banks watched in shock. The bodies of all of those on board—one pilot and five passengers—have been recovered from the wreckage, with Richard Cousins, chief executive of British catering giant Compass, identified as among the deceased. Cousins’ two sons in their early 20s and his fiancée and her 11-year-old daughter were also killed in the crash. Witnesses recalled seeing the aircraft, a DHC-2 Beaver Seaplane which was heading to Rose Bay in Sydney Harbor, do a sharp turn before plummeting straight into the water. The cause of the accident remains unknown with the investigation ongoing. Cousins, who was recently named by Harvard Business Review as one of the world’s best-performing CEOs, was due to step down from Compass this year.