Pilot Dies As Small Plane Crashes In Forest Area In Colorado

A pilot was killed after a small plane crashed in a forest area in Colorado, authorities confirmed Sunday. The wreckage was found a day after the aircraft went missing.

The plane's location was discovered after authorities received an emergency signal from the aircraft beacon on Sunday. The Jefferson County Sheriff's Office immediately sought the assistance of search and rescue personnel from the Alpine Rescue team, reports CBS Denver.

The rescuers found the wreckage and the remains of the pilot at the Lost Creek Wilderness, just west of Deckers. The identity of the pilot was not revealed.

"It is with heavy hearts that we announce the single occupant, an adult male, of the crashed plane was found deceased on scene. Our thoughts and prayers to his family and friends," the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office tweeted.

A volunteer with Alpine Rescue told a local news outlet that the plane was difficult to locate. "The plane was in the middle of nowhere, it was very difficult to locate," said Dawn Wilson.

"It was pretty dense trees, there would be a clearing now and then and we would keep cresting huge hills and rocks and thinking it would be on the other side, and we had to keep going," said Wilson.

The crash involved a Magnus Fusion 212 aircraft — a small, single-engine type, Hungarian-made sport plane engineered for aerobatics. It was not clear what caused the crash. But the outgoing radio traffic reportedly indicated that no flight plan was drawn up before the plane took off.

The sheriff's office was notified about the possible aircraft crash around 8:15 p.m. Saturday. But the search team couldn't locate the crash site as it was dark.

"It's really extremely rough terrain as you can probably see and as we moved forward, we had to wait until daylight and in daylight, we were able to use the Civil Air Patrol to find the downed aircraft, and at this point were waiting on recovery efforts of the plane," Sergeant Randall Owens told CBS News at the time.

Owens said the teams were trying to determine how to remove the wreckage.

The Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the incident, the sheriff's office said.