The Australian man who died along with a Peterborough woman on an island off Australia’s east coast has left behind a daughter in Peterborough.
The bodies of Julie Tutak, 38, of Peterborough, and Kurt Butler, 39, of Pelican Waters, were found on Saturday morning washed ashore on Bribie Island, 85 kilometres north of Brisbane.
Local police said they were not wearing life jackets and had been in the water for more than 24 hours before being spotted by a beach-goer.
A jetski belonging to Butler was found near their bodies which had “unexplained” injuries that initially raised concerns about their deaths.
However, police have since ruled their deaths the result of misadventure.
Butler, a resident of the sunshine coast, has one child. His 7-year-old daughter Ruby Miles Butler was born in Australia in 2010, two years after Butler met her mother, Jennifer Miles.
The mother and daughter moved to Peterborough in 2014 but maintained a close relationship with Butler.
Miles says Butler was a frequent visitor to Ontario.
Miles says Butler last visited the area three weeks ago and had rented a cottage on Stoney Lake, north of Peterborough, for the month of May.
“He’ll be very sorely missed from her life,” said Miles.
Friends quoted in several Australian newspapers describe Butler as a loving, devoted father who would video chat regularly with Ruby. The walls of a room where he stayed while working at a mining camp were covered in her photos.
“He was a fantastic father who loved his daughter dearly,” Maureen Jenkinson told The Sunshine Coast Daily. “Our lives were richer by having had the privilege to know and spend time with Kurt.”
The body of Tutak, a mother of two, is still in Australia as family await the results of a post-mortem examination.
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