Courtesy of Middletown Public Schools
Delilah Van Ness and Paul Pelletier
Updated at 5:17 p.m.
Four people from Connecticut, including a teenager, were killed after a small plane crashed on Sunday afternoon near the Basin Harbor Resort in Ferrisburgh, according to police.
The wreckage of the single-engine Piper plane was discovered just after midnight on Monday morning in a wooded area east of the Basin Harbor Airport. All four passengers were found dead:
Paul Pelletier, 55, of Columbia; Frank Rodriquez, 88, of Lebanon; Susan Van Ness, 51, of Middletown; and her daughter, Delilah Van Ness, 15, of Middletown.
No one reported a plane had crashed, according to police. Instead, relatives of the passengers notified police in Connecticut that the plane hadn't returned as expected to the Windham Airport near Willimantic, Conn. The private plane left that airport on Sunday morning and flew north for brunch at Basin Harbor.
Witnesses last saw the Piper on the Basin Harbor Airport runway around 12:15 p.m. Police in Connecticut informed the Vermont State Police about the missing plane around 10:20 p.m. on Sunday. A drone flown by Middlebury police helped investigators find the wreckage around 12:20 a.m. on Monday.
The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating the crash. Vermont State Police are investigating the deaths.
Pelletier was an aerospace teacher at Middletown High School, and Delilah Van Ness was a sophomore there.
"This unimaginable loss has left a void in our hearts and our community," Middletown Public Schools superintendent Dr. Alberto Vázquez Matos said in a statement. "Paul, Delilah, and Susan were special individuals. Their absence will be felt in our classrooms, hallways, and throughout our district and city."
Pelletier and Delilah Van Ness were featured in a June story
by TV station FOX 61 about Pelletier's "Drones and Flight Sciences" class, which taught first responders how to fly and operate drones.