Ubisoft Co-Founder Claude Guillemot Dies in Plane Crash

Claude Guillemot, one of five brothers who founded Ubisoft in 1986, died in a plane crash in La Baule-Escoublac, Loire-Atlantique. The Loire-Atlantique SDIS 44 fire and rescue services identified the 69-year-old co-founder as one of two victims; the other was the unidentified owner of the Cessna 421.

The Cessna 421 went down in a field near the La Baule aerodrome in the afternoon of June 19. The cause remains unconfirmed; La Baule mayor Franck Louvrier said (machine translated), "It was a Cessna 421, a twin-engine propeller, with eight seats[…]The plane was on approach for the landing phase, when, according to witnesses, it made a turn and crashed." Both victims’ families have been notified.

The aircraft burst into flames, igniting several football fields’ worth of vegetation. Sixty firefighters and thirty ambulances were mobilized to fight the blaze and to search for a possible third victim, though SDIS 44 described the search as "futile." Flags at the La Baule aerodrome were flown at half-mast on June 20 as a tribute.

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