UPDATED: Pilot in plane crash attended BHS

Bigfork Eagle and Northwest Montana News Network

A former Bigfork High School student was among those killed in a plane crash southwest of Dixon.

Sonny Kless, 25, was the pilot of the light plane with three passengers that went missing Sunday afternoon. The wreckage of the plane was spotted Wednesday in rough terrain just inside

the Sanders County line. There were no survivors.

Kless attended Bigfork High School for a time, and, according to the 2000 LeLac yearbook, was a member of the golf team and the choir as well as the speech, drama and debate team his freshman year. Kless was now a recent graduate of the University of Montana with a degree in environmental studies and communications and obtained his pilot license about a year ago.

Also on the plane were Daily Inter Lake reporters Erika Hoefer and Melissa Weaver and University of Montana law student Brian Williams.

The plane left the Kalispell City Airport on Sunday for a scenic flight, allegedly over Glacier National Park. Federal Aviation Administration radar data later showed the airplane had traveled from Kalispell north along the Whitefish Range, entered airspace above Glacier National Park, then headed south along the Swan Mountain Range and flew across Flathead Lake to the National Bison Range, according to FAA officials.

Kless was flying a 1968 Piper Arrow rented out of Missoula. The blue-and-white, single-engine plane was last tracked by radar at about 300 feet above ground level west of the 18,500-acre bison range at Moiese.

The search and rescue efforts had been ongoing since their absence was reported Monday morning.