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Pilot error likely cause of 2015 plane crash that killed Pamela Bird

Tookie Hensley, left, and Pamela Bird, right, were both killed when the small plane piloted by Bird crashed in 2015. The National Transportation Safety Board says pilot error resulted in the crash. (M Gardinier / Courtesy)

SAGLE, Idaho (AP) – A report says pilot error and insufficient preflight preparations are the likely causes of a 2015 small plane crash that killed three people.

The Bonner County Daily Bee reports that according to a final National Transportation Safety Board report published on Tuesday, pilot Pamela Bird likely caused the Oct. 8, 2015 crash in the Cabinet Mountains near Hope.

Bird, widow of renowned inventor Forrest Bird, and Donald and Tookie Hensley, of Mohave Valley, Arizona, were killed in the crash.

The flight left from the Bird Aviation Museum and Invention Center in Sagle, Idaho, which has its own airstrip. It was headed to Minot, North Dakota.

The report determined that, based on elevation of the wreckage, the pilot likely did not select an altitude sufficient to clear the mountains.