SARASOTA COUNTY, Fla. — Venice Police have identified the three victims of Saturday night's plane crash into the Gulf of Mexico.
Police identified the pilot as Christian Kath, 42, with the passengers being his wife, Misty Kath, 43, and their daughter Lily, 12. The family was living in St. Petersburg and had previously lived in Australia. Shorecrest Prep in St. Petersburg has also confirmed Lily was a student at the school.
Records showed Christian had only been a pilot for a short time, and he only began flying solo earlier in 2022. Venice Police said it's believed the family had flown to Venice from St. Petersburg to have dinner.
Authorities initiated a search Sunday morning following a Federal Aviation Administration inquiry to the Venice Municipal Airport about an overdue single-engine Piper Cherokee that had not returned to its origin airport in St. Petersburg, Florida.
Around the same time, recreational boaters found the body of a woman floating about 2.5 miles (4 kilometers) west of the Venice shore, city of Venice spokesperson Lorraine Anderson said in a statement.
Divers from the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office located the wreckage of the rented airplane around 2 p.m. about a third of a mile offshore, directly west of the Venice airport, Anderson said. The body of Lily Kath was found later.
Venice Police said Tuesday that after consulting with the Coast Guard, the search area for the missing pilot was expanded, but assets involved in the search have been scaled back. Police asked boaters from Sarasota Bay south to Gasparilla to be aware of the possibility of a body or small aircraft debris in the area.
The county sheriff’s office, the U.S. Coast Guard, the Sarasota Police Department, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and the District 12 Medical Examiner’s Office and the National Transportation Safety Board were involved in the investigation, Anderson said.
