The couple was flying home to Michigan from Georgia, relatives said, when the RV-9A plane Levon King built himself went down.
Part of the tail section of the plane wasn’t found at the crash scene, National Transportation Safety Board investigator Joshua Lindberg said, and it may have fallen off during flight.
Neighbors and local law enforcement said the tall crops surrounding the crash site could make the piece difficult to find.
“I would imagine it’s like finding a needle in a haystack,” Resident Noel Vanmalderen said. “You can see how tall the corn is now it’s not really going to come down anytime soon.”
The search for the site on Friday required a State Highway Patrol helicopter, said Lt. Brian Aller, Springfield Post Commander of the State Highway Patrol.
“The corn was seven to eight feet high,” Aller said. “And even getting on top of cars and trucks you still couldn’t have a good vantage point.”
If someone finds the wreckage, they should turn it in to local authorities, Aller said.
The area was hit with thunderstorms during the time of the crash, Vanmalderen said.
“We had a lot of lightning and it was heavy rains that day,” he said.
But investigators haven’t determined if weather played a role in the crash, Linberg said.
Witnesses saw the plane going toward the ground at a 45 degree angle before it went below a treeline, the Springfield News-Sun previously reported.
Jennifer Robinson and her husband heard a bang, she said, but didn’t see the crash.
Family of the Kings said they were shocked by the crash because Levon was careful to avoid flying in bad weather. King was a private pilot, certified in December 2009, as well as a repairman and a builder of experimental aircraft, certified in August 2015.
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