Close Friend: Five Victims "Lived And Breathed Airplanes"

Coast Guard searchers have found the wreckage of a Cessna technical, about two miles from the airport in Sitka (AK).  All five people on board were killed.
 
Pilot Michael Baker had reported difficulty with the aircraft's cargo door, according to a Coast Guard spokesman.  Baker told ATC he was going to take a look at the door when he landed in Sitka to refuel.  He never made it.  Controllers reported losing contact with Baker about two miles from the airfield at Sitka.  A Coast Guard helicopter found the wreckage in a heavily wooded area on Friday.
 
Also on board the 1975 model C-421 (file photo, right), Baker's wife, Kathleen, Richard and Catherine Lohman and Rick Mohnssen -- all from Colorado. 
 
Colorado Springs (CO) Chamber of Commerce President Jerry Biggs knew all five victims.  ''They were doing it more because they loved to fly. They all lived and breathed airplanes,'' Biggs said. ''They all knew what they were doing. I can never believe this happened," he said in an interview quoted by the Associated Press. 

 
''This hits a lot of people,'' said Warren Baker of Colorado Springs, 27, Michael Baker's son. ''They were five very prominent people. It's just a tragedy. It's hard to understand. We're all in shock.''
 
Baker, 56, was a Vietnam veteran-turned-general contractor. Along with his partner, Mohnssen, he built condominiums.  Baker's 52-year old wife was an accountant.  The Lohmans were attorneys. All three men on board were experienced pilots, according to Biggs.

FMI: www.faa.gov/avr/aai/iirform.htm