Two men who were killed in a plane crash in Co Kildare on Thursday have been named.
70-year-old James Price and 58-year-old Aidan Rowsome died after their small plane came down in a remote field at Belan, Moone in Athy.
Gardaí carried out a search with the Coast Guard helicopter rescue 116 and found the plane at around 4:30am.
The men's bodies have been taken to the mortuary in Naas General Hospital.
While the remains of the wreckage have been removed to an Air Accident Investigation Unit facility in Gormanston, Co Meath.
Investigators have said it is too early to say what may have caused the crash.
Lead investigator Howard Hughes said there was no distress signal from the plane, but a radio transponder code led rescuers to the crash site.
"I immediately contacted Dublin Air Traffic Control, where they commenced a playback of the ATC tapes for a particular time frame when it was assumed that the aircraft might have got airborne.
"The trace only lasted for about one minute - it's what's known as a 7,000 conspicuity transponder squawk that the pilot had put on, and it showed the position of the aircraft briefly in this area".
Main image: (Left to right) Air Accident investigators Howard Hughes and John Owens at a Garda media briefing near the scene of the light aircraft crash in Co Kildare | Image: Eamonn Farrell / RollingNews.ie
