Wreckage of twin-engine plane discovered FAA sends two to Rangeley mountain to investigate fatal weekend crash

RANGELEY – Investigators were trying to determine what caused a small twin-engine plane to crash into the side of Beaver Mountain while en route from Portland to Rangeley, killing the two people on board.

The Federal Aviation Administration sent two investigators to Rangeley after the wreckage was spotted shortly after daybreak Saturday.

The dead were tentatively identified as Edson Mitchell III, 47, a member of the board of directors of Deutsche Bank in London, and Stephen Bean, 58, of Rangeley, owner of Mountain Air Service.

Mitchell, who owned the Beech 200 turboprop and had a vacation home in Rangeley, was a Maine native and Colby College graduate who was on the school’s board of trustees.

Bean was piloting the plane when it was reported missing Friday night.

Hours later, game wardens reached the crash site and recovered the bodies of the two men, which were being taken to Augusta for autopsies by the state medical examiner, according to Stephen McCausland, spokesman for the state Department of Public Safety.

The aircraft was reported five miles south of Rangeley’s airport Friday night when last heard from. An initial search overnight was unsuccessful.

The wreckage was spotted Saturday morning from a warden service plane about 15 minutes after the search plane took off from the Rangeley airport, McCausland said.

FAA New England regional spokesman Jim Peters said the plane left Portland shortly before 5 p.m. Friday.