{"id":174303,"date":"2026-03-25T06:33:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-25T06:33:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/174303\/"},"modified":"2026-03-25T06:33:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T06:33:13","slug":"toronto-cafe-owner-tried-texting-air-canada-pilot-mackenzie-gunther-after-laguardia-plane-crash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/174303\/","title":{"rendered":"Toronto cafe owner tried texting Air Canada pilot Mackenzie Gunther after LaGuardia plane crash"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The owner of a Toronto coffee shop that was a favorite of Air Canada pilot Mackenzie\u00a0Gunther told The Post on Tuesday he tried texting his loyal customer after hearing of the LaGuardia Airport plane crash.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen I didn\u2019t hear back after a day, I thought it isn\u2019t a good sign,\u201d said Daniel Biro, owner and roaster of Rapid Ends Coffee in Peterborough, Ontario.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/03\/23\/us-news\/co-pilot-killed-in-laguardia-plane-crash-idd-as-mackenzie-gunther\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Gunther was killed in Sunday\u2019s crash<\/a>, as was co-pilot Antoine Forest.<\/p>\n<p>The regional jet crashed into a firetruck moments after landing. REUTERS<\/p>\n<p>Daniel Biro, owner and roaster of Rapid Ends Coffee in Peterborough, Ontario, which was a hot spot for pilot Mackenzie\u00a0Gunther, told The Post on Tuesday he tried texting his loyal customer after hearing about the crash. Instagram\/@rapidsendcoffee<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMacKenzie was an amazing young man. He just graduated a couple years ago. He was a regular here every week while he was in school,\u201d Biro said \u2014 adding that the pilot had been recently married.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe had his whole life for him. It\u2019s super tragic.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Gunther and Forest were killed <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/03\/23\/us-news\/air-canada-flight-firetruck-collide-at-laguardia-reports\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">when their jet collided<\/a> with a Port Authority fire truck on a runway at the Queens airport shortly before midnight Sunday. <\/p>\n<p>Over 40 passengers and crew were also injured <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/03\/23\/us-news\/laguardia-airport-plane-crash-live-updates\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">in the shocking wreck<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Biro said Gunther had been in the shop just two weeks before and that his regular order was a cold brew, black or an espresso over ice. <\/p>\n<p>The shop owner called Gunther a coffee \u201cpurist.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Latest coverage on the deadly Air Canada crash at LaGuardia Airport<\/p>\n<p>He said he would occasionally talk shop with Gunther over the years, learning how the tragic man had been \u201creally excited\u201d about becoming a pilot.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat was his passion, flying. It was a life taken too young,\u201d Biro said.<\/p>\n<p>Biro wrote on Facebook that the cafe plans on honoring Gunther by combining his favorites: Haitian coffee and cold brew, into a signature drink they will be giving out for free while offering patrons cards to sign for his widow.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\tStart your day with all you need to know\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p class=\"inline-module__cta\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tMorning Report delivers the latest news, videos, photos and more.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\tThanks for signing up!\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe was an upstanding young man,\u201d the coffee-shop owner said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The owner of a Toronto coffee shop that was a favorite of Air Canada pilot Mackenzie\u00a0Gunther told The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":174304,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,24522,57,9,24,63,70194,6649,129,131,130,9419,58],"class_list":["post-174303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-coffee-shops","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-pilot","tag-plane-crashes","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news","tag-toronto","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=174303"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174303\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/174304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}