HALF MOON BAY — A second person died when a plane crashed off the Half Moon Bay coast on Sunday, according to a preliminary report from the Federal Aviation Administration.
The report came a day after the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office announced that a female body had been found by the crew of a commercial fishing boat near the crash site around the same time that crews had started searching Monday morning. Officials did not say Monday how many people had been believed to be aboard the four-seat plane when it went down.
The FAA’s preliminary report noted that a Cozy Mark IV homebuilt aircraft crashed into the ocean due to unknown circumstances. The FAA report lists the time of the incident at 7:40 p.m. Sunday; Initial reports from local authorities put the crash closer to 7:15 p.m.
A caller to authorities on Sunday evening said they saw a plane flying “erratically” in the area of the Half Moon Bay Airport and Moss Beach Distillery. They said the plane’s engine sputtered out and that the plane had likely gone down.
Two fatalities are listed in the FAA report: one member of the flight crew — presumably the pilot — and one passenger. The plane, assembled by users from kits sold by a Southern California company, features a rear-propeller design and seats up to three passengers, along with the pilot.
The people killed in the crash were not identified publicly Tuesday by the San Mateo County Coroner’s Office.
Both the Coast Guard and Sheriff’s Office suspended their search efforts on Monday after using boats, divers, a helicopter and a drone. Rescuers from both agencies looked in a 28-square-mile area for nearly six hours before calling off the effort.
A sheriff’s office drone located what appeared to be wreckage in the water. Crews and others reported seeing debris wash ashore near the crash site, including what looked to be part of a wing, according to Sheriff’s Sgt. Philip Hallworth.
The FAA report didn’t reveal the airport that the plane departed from before the crash, but a sheriff’s office official reiterated on Tuesday morning that their investigators believed that it took off from an unspecified airport in the East Bay.
Both the sheriff’s office and the FAA confirmed to the Bay Area News Group on Tuesday that the National Transportation Safety Board was taking over the investigation. The NTSB did not immediately respond to requests for comment.