HOT SULPHUR SPRINGS, Colo. -- The wreckage of a small plane that crashed three years ago and the remains of two men who were aboard the aircraft were found during the weekend in the Rockies, officials said today.
The bodies, discovered Saturday, were identified as James Jeb Caddell, 38, an oilman turned pilot from Dallas, and his assistant, Ronald Hugh Wilmond, 36, of Ardmore, Okla.
The two men were returning from Walden, Colo., to Denver on Aug. 10, 1984, on their first assignment for Caddell's new business inspecting pipelines from the air.
The wreckage of their Cessna L-19 was found by a 14-year-old hiker Saturday in the Arapahoe National Forest area near Meadow Creek Reservoir at an elevation of about 10,200 feet, sheriff's spokesman Glenn Wapner said.
A friend of Caddell, Scott Chisholm of Dallas, said that in 1983, Caddell came up with the idea of contracting with oil companies to inspect their pipelines from the air. At the time of the crash, he had never flown in the mountains.
The Cessna L-19, originally designed for use by the French air force, was purchased in pieces and reassembled in Dallas.
Chisholm said Caddell's father flew to Colorado, where he planned to cremate hisson's remains and scatter them over the mountains he loved.
