A small plane carrying five adults and one child went down in a wooded area of Wisconsin Tuesday night, killing every person aboard.
The final minutes described by federal investigators are terrifying.
The Piper PA-46 was flying at 24,000 feet when the pilot reported icing and asked air traffic control for permission to descend, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
Controllers approved the request. The airplane then entered a right descending turn that became progressively steeper before communications and radar-position data vanished.
There were no survivors.
The first widely shared report captured the scale of the tragedy:
The crash happened in the Town of Dellona, near Mirror Lake State Park and roughly 10 miles southwest of Wisconsin Dells.
Sauk County dispatchers began receiving reports of a downed aircraft near Park Lane at approximately 9:31 p.m. Tuesday.
Deputies, firefighters and emergency medical crews converged on the area. The wreckage was located north of Park Lane and west of Herwig Road in dense woods, where responders began searching for survivors.
They found all six occupants dead at the scene.
The victims were five adults and one child. Their names had not been released as of Wednesday morning while authorities worked to notify their families.
No one on the ground was hurt, and authorities reported no damage to nearby structures.
A flight-path playback shared after the crash shows the airplane’s route before contact was lost:
The Associated Press reports that the six-seat, single-engine airplane was returning from Kenosha to Menomonie when it crashed shortly before 10 p.m. Rain was falling while a thunderstorm moved across the area.
According to the NTSB’s initial account provided to the outlet, the pilot reported icing while cruising at 24,000 feet and requested a descent. After air traffic control cleared the airplane lower, radar-position data showed a right descending turn that increased in rate until both data and radio contact ended.
Those facts offer investigators an important starting point, but they do not yet establish a probable cause. Aircraft icing, weather conditions, the pilot’s actions, mechanical systems and air traffic communications will all require a methodical review before the NTSB reaches a final conclusion.
The NTSB and Federal Aviation Administration are now leading the investigation. The crash site remained secured Wednesday as investigators began documenting the wreckage and gathering evidence.
The Piper PA-46 is a family of pressurized, single-engine aircraft built for high-altitude travel. Federal officials had not released the airplane’s registration or specific PA-46 variant in their first public updates.
That detail is important because the PA-46 family includes multiple piston and turboprop models with different systems and performance characteristics.
The sheriff’s public statement was circulated Wednesday along with confirmation that all six people had been located:
WBAY reports that Sheriff Chip Meister confirmed the airplane had been in contact with a nearby air traffic control tower before the crash. Investigators are examining what was said during those transmissions and whether weather played a role.
The outlet says neighbors heard what sounded like a crash and joined the initial search before emergency crews secured the area. Responding agencies included the Lake Delton Police Department, Delton Fire Department, Dells/Delton EMS, the Sauk County Coroner’s Office and the Wisconsin State Patrol.
The first call reached dispatch at approximately 9:31 p.m., sending crews into a densely wooded area near Mirror Lake State Park. Darkness, rain and the remote terrain complicated the response as personnel searched for the wreckage and accounted for everyone aboard.
Authorities asked the public to stay away from the scene while investigators worked through the difficult terrain. The victims’ names remained withheld pending formal identification and family notifications.
The ABC News account says officials used the aircraft information and flight manifest during the overnight search to determine who was believed to be aboard. The sheriff’s office then confirmed that every occupant had been located deceased.
ABC also reports that the FAA identified the airplane as a Piper PA-46 and that the NTSB will lead the federal investigation. A preliminary report may provide more factual detail in the coming weeks, while a final probable-cause determination can take far longer.
For now, six families are facing the kind of news no family should ever receive.
Five adults and one child left Kenosha aboard a small airplane Tuesday evening. They never made it home to Menomonie.
Please keep their loved ones — and the first responders who searched those woods — in your prayers.
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[ H/T WLT Report ]
