Heartbreak: Parents of Du Quoin Man Killed in Arizona Plane Crash

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Authorities have recovered the bodies of a Aguila, Ariz. couple Tuesday from the wreckage of a small plane in Northern Arizona.

Authorities identified the victims as 74-year-old Ralph Smith and his 71-year-old wife, Frances Smith.

The couple flew their single engine plane into Southern Illinois last week for a visit with their son, Ralph Smith and wife Sherry who reside on East Jackson Street and are said to have departed from the Pinckneyville-Du Quoin airport for their return trip to Arizona on Sunday.

The AP bureau in Phoenix lists the Illinois departure site as St. Johns, but that account is apparently in error.

FAA officials said the single engine plane departed Sunday from the Pinckneyville-Du Quoin Airport and was supposed to have arrived later that day in Aguila, a town west of Wickenburg, Ariz.

When the plane did not arrive, relatives notified authorities.

Yavatai County Sheriff's officials say the crash site was on a remote mountainside in Horse Thief Basin area near Crown King, about 25 miles southeast of Prescott.

Authorities say Arizona Bureau of Land Management ground crews working a one-acre wildfire in a mountainous area just south of Crown King discovered the wreckage in a remote area Monday afternoon and one fatality was confirmed.

Recovery efforts resumed Tuesday morning and authorities say when the second body was discovered. National Transportation Safety Board officials were at the crash scene Tuesday and have assume responsibility for the investigation.