The two men who died in a plane crash in Ottawa's southwest end Wednesday night have been identified.

Ottawa denturist Barry Stratton, 55, was the pilot of the plane. Jacques Domey, who was in his sixties, was his passenger. The good friends owned the plane along with three other men

Stratton had been a member of the Rockcliffe Flying Club, where the plane was registered, since 2003. Domey had been a pilot since 1975 and was known for undertaking many cross-country trips.

Domey had recently retired from the National Research Council, where he worked for over twenty years.

The victims' families are reeling from the loss.

"He was a great man and a great pilot," said Natalie Stratton, Barry's daughter.

The men were both passionate flyers.

"This morning a couple of tears were shed," said Simon Garrett, manager of the Rockcliffe Flying Club. "It's been a very somber environment this morning."

The four-seater Cessna the men were flying in slammed into a field on Leikin Drive in Barrhaven at about 7:30 p.m.

The plane, marked with the letters 'CFEFQ' and registered to an address in Gatineau, was on its way back to Ottawa from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania after an eleven-day trip that included stops in Florida and the Bahamas.

The plane took off from Pennsylvania at about 5 p.m.

Emergency crews searched frantically in the Fallowfield Road and Prince of Wales Drive area for about half an hour before they found the plane, which went "off radar" while trying to land at the Carp Airport.

Weather reports show that visibility was poor at the time of the crash, with clouds only about 200 feet above the ground around the time of the crash.

After spending the day analyzing the crash site, TSB crews began to remove the wreckage shortly after 3 p.m. Thursday.

The pieces of the plane will be taken to a lab where officials say they will go over the evidence with a "fine tooth comb."

The single-engine plane knocked down several hydro poles as it went down. The impact of the crash broke the plane into two pieces.

The downed hydro wires made it difficult for emergency crews to get to the wreckage. But TSB officials were able to confirm the deaths shortly before 9 p.m.

Paramedics believed the men died immediately after the crash.

The plane was built in 1969.

With reports from CTV Ottawa's John Hua and Karen Soloman