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Investigators look for cause of Montana plane crash that killed 14

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Federal investigators arrived early Monday in Butte to investigate the crash of a private airplane that the Federal Aviation Administration said left seven children and seven adults dead.

The group might have been headed to a ski trip, federal officials say, but the destruction at the crash site, inside Holy Cross Cemetery, left very few immediate clues.

The crash site was compact. No large chunks of the plane -- a single-engine Pilatus PC 12 -- were readily apparent.

Someone, most likely local residents, set up crosses outside the gates of the cemetery, serving as a makeshift memorial for the dead. Others brought flowers.
The flight was headed to Bozeman, Montana, but was rerouted to Butte instead, said FAA spokesman Mike Fergus. The plane crashed 500 feet short of the runway at Bert Mooney Airport.

No one on the ground was injured, Sheriff John Walsh said.

The weather, which was clear Sunday, does not appear to have been a factor.

The flight did not have a cockpit voice recorder or a flight data recorder, officials with the National Transportation Safety Board said. Private planes are not required to have the devices.

Martha Guidoni told CNN that she and her husband witnessed the plane crash. She photographed one of the first images from the scene, which showed the cemetery in the foreground of a huge blaze. iReport.com: iReporter at scene of crash

"We were just taking a ride -- all of a sudden, we watched this plane just take a nosedive," she told CNN. "We drove into the cemetery to see if there was any way my husband could help someone. We were too late -- there was nothing to help."

Her husband, Steve Guidoni, said the plane "went into the ground" and the flames set a tree on fire.

"I looked to see if there was anybody I could pull out, but there wasn't anything there, I couldn't see anything," he told CNN. "There was some luggage strewn around. ... There was some plane parts."

The flight plan originated in Redlands, California, according to flight-tracking site FBOweb.com. Stops were made in Vacaville and Oroville, California, before the plane headed for Montana.

The plane stopped at the Oroville airport about 11 a.m., refueled, and departed about half an hour later, said Police Chief Kirk Trostle.

"There were some adults and children on board," he told reporters Sunday evening, adding that the passengers got out briefly to stretch while the pilot refueled the plane.

Eric Teitelman, Oroville's director of community development and public works, said the small airport has no control tower, but, because it has a "wide-open runway" and a self-service fuel system, it is a frequent stop for general aviation aircraft.

There were conflicting reports about ownership of the plane, manufactured in 2001.