Local News in Brief : Storm Again Halts Search for Fliers

For the fourth time in five days, bad weather halted the search Saturday for a Simi Valley couple whose small plane disappeared on a flight from Arizona last week.

Annie Cadoret, 48, and her husband, Dollard (Dell) Cadoret, 55, left Bullhead City in their single-engine Piper Cherokee 140 last Sunday. They were due at Whiteman Airport in Pacoima later that day, authorities said.

The U.S. Civil Air Patrol has moved the search base from Whiteman to Apple Valley Airport near Victorville, which is closer to where the plane may have gone down, said Air Patrol Maj. Henry Saffold.

The search was to resume today if weather permits.

Authorities said they were uncertain whether the plane crashed or made a successful emergency landing.

The husband and wife are experienced pilots, and it was believed that Annie Cadoret was at the controls when the plane left Arizona, Saffold said.

The Cadorets tried four times within a half hour of takeoff to establish radio contact with an air communications station in Prescott, Ariz., but the transmissions were incomplete, Saffold said. The dispatches could be a sign that they encountered trouble, he said.

Searchers were becoming more pessimistic about the couple’s chance of survival as the days pass, Saffold said. But they were hoping the couple had landed safely and were waiting to be found, he said. The search began Tuesday.

“We’re getting to where we sometimes pray a lot,” Saffold said.

Dollard Cadoret is vice president of production at Hydro-Mill Co., a Chatsworth aircraft parts manufacturer, Saffold said.