Three people died after a small plane crashed Sunday night just north of Jamestown, the Chautauqua County Sheriff's Office said.
Authorities located the wreckage Monday morning in the Town of Ellicott, about a mile east of Jamestown Airport.
The Chautauqua County Sheriff's Office identified the three people who died in the crash as Alan Fuller, Valerie Holmes and Linda Edwards.
All three were from northern Pennsylvania, sheriff's officials told reporters at a morning news conference, according to WIVB-TV.
The small aircraft that had three people on board was flying from North Carolina when airport officials lost contact with the plane at approximately 5:47 p.m. Sunday, Sheriff James Quattrone said.
Authorities found the wreckage between Routes 380 and 60 in the Town of Ellicott, the Sheriff's Office said.
People are also reading…
In densely wooded terrain between those two roadways, emergency workers were seen descending a hill and walking east, towards Route 380.
Quattrone said the privately owned plane was based in Jamestown. He said the three people on board were "the pilot, his sister and a family friend."
"We do believe the weather played a major role, there were some high winds," Quattrone said of the crash, saying that winds also hampered the Sunday night search.
Weather conditions around the time authorities lost contact with the plane indicate wind gusts in the low to mid-30s, according to National Weather Service data. At 5:56 p.m., winds were blowing at 22 mph and gusting to 35 mph. Conditions were described as "light snow, fog/mist and breezy," according to weather service data. Visibility was down to one mile.
Part of Chautauqua County Route 380 was closed to traffic Monday as authorities found the wreckage of Sunday night's small plane crash in the Town of Ellicott.
The plane was flying to Jamestown from Burlington-Alamance Regional Airport in Burlington, N.C., and was about a mile from Jamestown Airport when authorities lost contact, according to information described as "preliminary" released by the Federal Aviation Administration.
The plane was believed to be a twin-engine Grumman American GA-7, an FAA spokeswoman said.
The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate, the FAA spokeswoman said.
According to flightaware.com, the plane took off from Burlington at 2:58 p.m. Sunday, on its way to Jamestown Airport. It had been scheduled to take off at 3 p.m. and to land at 5:14 p.m., according to the flight-tracking website.
The plane had flown another flight earlier Sunday, from Manteo, N.C., to Burlington, according to the site.
The plane was owned by Cougar Air JV LLC, according to flightaware.com. Crash investigators have not yet disclosed the plane's tail number.
Quattrone said he has been told that the pilot co-owned the plane with another person, but that he had not confirmed that.Â
Quattrone said authorities have told him that there were no mayday or distress signals during the flight.
At a briefing held a couple hours before the plane was found, Quattrone said authorities did locate signals from the last locations of the pilot's cellphone as well as the plane's black box, and those areas were searched last night. He said he was hopeful that there would be air support Monday to check areas that were searched Sunday night, "just to confirm that there may not be any wreckage or debris there."Â Â
"We're hoping to have some air support, either drones or possibly the State Police helicopter, that will help us with that search," Quattrone said. "With the leaves off the trees we're hoping to be able to find something relatively soon."Â
The Sheriff's Office said it is working with the FAA and that the Department of Homeland Security was sending a representative to assist in the investigation.
Quattrone said a search that involved approximately 135 volunteers had to be suspended around 1 a.m. Sunday morning "due to weather and due to the rough terrain."
The Fluvanna Fire Department of Jamestown was among 13 volunteer fire departments involved in Sunday night's search, which also included five police agencies, Quattrone said.
"It was a difficult call to discontinue last night," Quattrone said, "but we did not want to risk the safety of any of our volunteers or any of the searchers who were out there."

