Six Killed in Wisconsin Plane Crash Identified, Including Four Members of One Family; Pilot Reported Wing Icing Before Losing Contact
Madison — The Sauk County Sheriff's Office on Thursday, October 15, released the names of all six people killed when a small plane crashed near Mirror Lake State Park on the night of October 13, the Associated Press and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. The victims were the pilot, Ronald R. Riek, 63, of Woodville; Tyler J. Harvey, 36, of Cadott; Mary K. Brion, 67, of Nelson; Amanda M. Haremza, 45, of Altoona; Rylan Haremza, 13, of Altoona; and Kayla C. Turpin, 39, of Eau Claire. The sheriff's office said no further information would be released at this time and that the investigation is ongoing.
Family members told the AP that Brion, her daughters Amanda and Kayla, and her 13-year-old grandson Rylan had flown to the Kenosha area to surprise Brion's granddaughters, who were playing in a high school volleyball game in Salem — a trip of more than five hours each way by car. "We never had much money, she just wanted to find her joy," Mary's husband, David Brion, said. "This trip they were really excited about." Riek, a friend of the family's son-in-law and the plane's owner, had offered to fly them there and back in his six-seat Piper PA-46. Harvey, who was also aboard, was a certified flight instructor who worked for Gibson Aviation Services.
The sheriff's office said the dispatch center received multiple reports of a plane down at about 9:31 p.m. on October 13, and responders found the wreckage in a densely wooded area north of Park Lane and west of Herwig Road, near Mirror Lake State Park in the Town of Dellona, about 10 miles west of Wisconsin Dells. All six people aboard were dead; no one on the ground was hurt and no structures were damaged. Sheriff Chip Meister said the plane had been in contact with a nearby air traffic control tower before the crash. According to preliminary information from the National Transportation Safety Board, the single- engine Piper PA-46 was returning from Kenosha to Menomonie when, cruising at about 24,000 feet, the pilot reported ice building up on the wings and requested a descent. Air traffic control approved the descent, and the plane "entered a right descending turn that increased in rate until communications and data tracking were lost," the board said. Rain was falling and a thunderstorm was moving across the area at the time.
Federal Aviation Administration records show Riek held an airline transport pilot rating, which requires at least 1,500 hours of flight experience and the skills of an airline captain. Daniel Johnson, chairman of the Menomonie Airport Commission, paid tribute to Riek at a public meeting on October 14: "He was simply a good man. A highly experienced pilot, and this was simply a tragedy." Johnson also said the type of plane Riek was flying was known for issues during storms. The FAA and the NTSB will lead the investigation into the cause; no conclusion has been announced.
Citing NTSB data, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that fatal plane crashes have occurred every year in Wisconsin since 1968, and that the most recent crash to exceed five deaths was a July 2017 accident in Catawba that killed six. Small planes governed by the FAA's Part 91 rules, like the one in this crash, account for the majority of U.S. crashes in 2026 — 96 of 105.
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：派珀 PA-46 系列飞机（M350 型）资料照片，非涉事飞机。照片：Matti Blume／Wikimedia Commons（CC BY-SA 4.0）。File photo of a Piper PA-46 series aircraft (M350), not the accident aircraft. Photo: Matti Blume / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).
