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• Icing likely cause of plane crash that killed three Hudson-area people

Icing was the likely cause of a Jan. 30, 2009, airplane crash in which three Hudson-area people died, according to the final report on the crash from the National Transportation Safety Board.

Brett Weller, 44, of Hudson, and Laurence, 51, and Vicki Berg, 53, of Houlton died in the crash five miles north of Menomonie.

Laurence Berg was piloting the Cirrus SR20 single-engine plane. He was a relatively new pilot, having received his private pilot's certificate two and a half years earlier.

The report says his pilot's logbook indicated that he had a total of 440 flight hours and had flown the Cirrus SR20 that crashed for 22 hours. He had received 13.2 hours of flight training in another Cirrus SR22 and had flown that plane an additional 45.6 hours, the report indicates.

The NTSB report says Berg had received a preflight weather briefing about five hours before the crash advising that conditions "might be more conductive for icing" on his return trip from Sheboygan.

Berg and Weller had flown out of New Richmond Regional Airport at 5:45 p.m. and arrived at Sheboygan County Memorial Airport at around 7:30 p.m., according to the report.

They picked up Vicki Berg at the Sheboygan airport and began the return flight to New Richmond at 8:05 p.m.

The report says air traffic control advised Laurence Berg at 9:41 p.m. that it was in radar contact with his plane, but couldn't determine its altitude. Berg replied that they were at 4,500 feet and descending.

A minute later, the air traffic controller asked Berg if he was encountering any icing.

Berg replied that he wasn't.

The controller then told him there were reports of moderate icing at 3,000 to 4,000 feet, about 30 to 40 miles north of Minneapolis.

"OK, we'll keep our eyes open. Thanks," the report quotes Berg as saying.

The crash is reported to have happened two minutes later.

The NTSB report says there was a 70 percent probability of icing occurring over the accident site. Weather reports indicated light snow and mist in the area, and light freezing drizzle was expected in northern portions of Wisconsin, according to the NTSB report.

Brett Weller was a past board chair of the Hudson Area Chamber of Commerce & Tourism Bureau. He had been active in the Hudson business community for more than 20 years and was an account manager and business developer for Kinziegreen Marketing Group at the time of his death.

Weller and his wife, Mary, had gotten married just three months earlier.

Laurence Berg had worked for Anderson Windows in Bayport, Minn., for 31 years. He led a team that supported the sales and marketing needs of the company's top dealers.

Vicki Berg was a nurse anesthetist who owned Vital Anesthesia Services and traveled to many hospitals in the region. She had gone to Sheboygan for business.