Three men were killed, including a father and his adult son, when a single-engine Piper Cherokee crashed in a wooded area near a residential neighborhood in Bowie, authorities said on Sunday.
The aircraft, believed to belong to a local flight school and possibly conducting a training flight, took off from Ocean City at about 11:30 p.m. Saturday and was headed to Montgomery County Airpark when it went down roughly 15 minutes later.
A search operation was launched after an iPhone crash alert was received near the Bowie area. Rescuers later located the wreckage in dense woods and recovered the bodies of three adult men aboard.
No injuries were reported on the ground despite the crash occurring close to a residential area, according to news reports.
The victims’ identities have not been released pending notification of their families. The cause of the crash is under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration.
