(August 17, 2008)—The wreckage of the single-engine plane in which a Texas couple and their two young children disappeared Friday after taking off from Steamboat Springs, Colo. to return to Brenham was found Sunday, and relatives say there were no survivors.
A hiker reportedly came upon the wreckage Sunday afternoon at Georgia Pass in the Colorado mountains east of Breckenridge, near the area where seven teams were searching for the plane.
Searchers, hampered by inclement weather and early snowfall, were covering an area from Keystone Mountain to Georgia Pass.
Pilot Tommy Jacomini, 42, of Houston, his wife Susie, and their 7-year-old son Tommy and 5-year-old daughter Vivi left Steamboat Springs in the Cessna 82 on Friday.
They were expected to arrive in Brenham around 8:30 p.m. Friday, but they never showed up.
Tommy Jacomini's parents, Tommy, Sr. and Beverly Jacomini had planned to pick the family up at the Brenham airport Friday evening, but said they never received a call that the family was en route.
According to relatives, who had been maintaining a vigil since Saturday, the Jacominis flew out of Steamboat Springs heading southeast toward Kremmling, in the 2005 single-engine Cessna.
They say the airport was in communication with Tommy Jacomini about 15 minutes after the 9 a.m. takeoff.
The family believes he was in the process of filing a flight plan, but it wasn’t completed, because the airport lost all communication with the plane, which disappeared from radar.
Summit County sheriff's officials say radar detected the four-seat Cessna 182 plane Friday near Green Mountain Reservoir, about 30 miles northwest of Sunday's search area.
"Radar images show the plane entering Summit County on the northern end of the county and then going off radar, which is not unusual, but never showing up where the radar normally begins to reveal aircraft again on the southern end of the county at the Continental Divide," according to a Summit County Sheriff's office release quoted by the Denver Post.
On Saturday, relatives gathered to await word at the Jacomini family farm in Winedale, in western Washington County.
Tommy and Susie Jacomini have a second home there, as do Tommy's parents.
The Jacominis’ relatives say the family was vacationing at a home owned by Susie Jacomini's parents, in Steamboat Springs.
Relatives say Jacomini, a seasoned pilot, rented the Cessna in Colorado.
Airport officials told the family they don't believe the craft's emergency locator transmitter, or ELT, was activated.
The family says pilot Tommy Jacomini comes from a family of recreational pilots and has been flying for 25 years.
"They're wonderful people," said Don Ervin, the pilot's uncle, on Saturday.
"Everyone's heart is broken that we can't contact them, that we haven't been in contact with them. We're hoping for the best and terrified about the worst."
(Ashlea Sigman and Steve Fullhart, KBTX-TV contributed to this story)
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