Missing airplane is found

[Eugene A. Calame]

Missing airplane is found; 3 killed: Victims belonged to
Nevada City family

By John D. Cox
Bee Staff Writer
(Published Nov. 2, 1998)

Searchers in rugged terrain northwest of Reno confirmed their fears
Sunday with the discovery of the charred wreckage of a small plane and
the bodies of three members of a longtime Sierra foothills family.

Killed in the Cessna 182 crash were all three people aboard: pilot
William Goss, 53; his wife, Karen, 53; and their son, Matthew, 23; all
of Nevada City.

"They were just really well-loved people," said family friend Judy
Vargas of Nevada City. "Their families had been up in this part of the
country for years and years."

They died on their way to a family funeral. Services for William Goss'
father, Lonnie Goss, were held Friday in Hamilton, Mont.

The family's plane left Grass Valley early Thursday on the first leg
of a flight to Montana. It was scheduled to stop in Winnemucca, Nev.,
to pick up the couple's eldest son, Vance, and continue on to
Hamilton.

But the aircraft disappeared from radar Thursday in the mountains
south of Pyramid Lake, 30 miles northwest of Reno. More than 100
searchers from seven Nevada counties, the Civil Air Patrol and
the Pyramid Lake Tribal Police Department joined in the search.

In Reno, Washoe County Sheriff's Lt. Geof Wise said a helicopter pilot
spotted the downed aircraft near Big Mouth Canyon south of the desert
lake.

Cause of the crash was under investigation.

William Goss was known as an experienced pilot. "He'd been flying for
many years," Vargas said.

The senior Goss was employed by a Grass Valley construction company,
Hansen Brothers Enterprises. Karen Goss, a medical transcriber, worked
at her home for a Southern California firm.

Matthew Goss was a senior at California State University, Chico, where
he was an English major.

He was a nationally recognized shot-put thrower, and previously
played football at Nevada Union High School and Sierra College in
Rocklin.

"They were a very close family," Vargas said. Karen Goss was the
daughter of Arlie and Sibley Hansen of Grass Valley.