According to the "Blaue Funken" carnival association, one of the four victims of the plane crash over the Baltic Sea on Sunday is its honorary president.

One mourns the 72-year-old Peter Griesemann and the other three inmates - his wife, daughter and their partner, said the Cologne association on Friday. The four were "taken in an incredibly tragic way in a plane crash," it said in a statement.

A private plane with four occupants flew over the Baltic Sea on Sunday on its way from Spain to Cologne and crashed into the sea off the coast west of the Latvian port city of Ventspils.

Obituary of the "Blue Sparks"

Rescue workers had found remains of the crashed machine and personal belongings of the occupants. The identity of the passengers has not yet been officially confirmed. The systems engineering company Griesemann from Wesseling near Cologne recently announced that the four missing persons were the company founder, two family members and one other person.

In an obituary by the "Blaue Funken" for their honorary president, it said: "Despite all the concentration on his entrepreneurial activities, he had a great deal of fine humor, a high level of social responsibility and enormous helpfulness." His great passion was the "Blue Sparks". The association will lay out a condolence book for the public.