Fossett’s plane slammed into a mountain

THIRTEEN months after millionaire thrill-seeker Steve Fossett mysteriously disappeared, authorities finally know what happened to his small single-engine airplane: It slammed straight into a mountain on a cloudy day.

“It was a hard-impact crash, and he would’ve died instantly,” said Jeff Page, emergency management coordinator for Lyon County, Nevada, who assisted in the search.

The debris, hidden from view for more than a year, littered an area longer than a football field and nearly as wide as a steep Sierra Nevada mountainside some 10,000 feet above sea level.

It appears to have been a tragic end for the intrepid ballonist, who was scouting locations for an attempt to break the land speed record in a rocket-propelled car.

Crews with cadaver dogs located a few personal effects amid the mangled metal, along with a small bone fragment.

“I hope now to be able to bring to closure a very painful chapter in my life,” his widow, Peggy, said in a statement. “I prefer to think about Steve’s life rather than his death and celebrate his many extraordinary accomplishments.”

Search teams planned to hike back out to the site yesterday to scour the steep flank for more traces of the missing aviator.

The National Transportation Safety Board said the remains found were enough to perform DNA tests to determine if they belonged to Fossett.