U.S. Women Die in Plane Crash

March 7, 2001 -- The rings on the fingers of Gwen Bloomingdale and Barbara Gard best summed up their spirit of adventure.

"Dare, Dream, Discover" read the inscription on the rings of the two Provincetown, Mass., women who set off for a dream adventure last month: a five-month odyssey in their Aero Commander twin-engine plane.

But their dreams were reduced to debris off the coast of Iceland on Tuesday. Bloomingdale and Gard's twin engine aircraft fell from 15,000 feet and crashed off the coast of Iceland's Westman Island, the U.S. State Department confirmed.

Aviation officials received their last radio signal at 8:55 a.m. local time and the plane dropped off radar about five minutes later, according to a State Department spokesman.

Authorities confirm that the body of one of the women and remains of the other were recovered. No cause for the accident has been determined.

Off To A Great Race

The two women were on their way to participate in the London-Sydney Air Race of 2001, which is scheduled to begin Sunday.

The race over the longest air route in the world is part of Australia's Centenary of Federation celebrations and marks only the third time such a race has been held.

Participants are expected to complete the race in 28 days.

Bloomingdale, 59, and Gard, 52, were originally the first all-female team to enter the race, but two other American women teams subsequently joined.

Nevertheless, the two Provincetown-locals were not unduly distressed. "It's flattering that we've attracted competition," Bloomingdale said in an interview with the Provincetown Banner, a local weekly newspaper.

"We're glad that our entry motivated other women to join us," added Gard in the Provincetown Banner. "The race is becoming a race within a race — within our class of twin-engine aircraft and within our band of all-women teams."

Enthusiastic Aviators

The two women were enthusiastic aviators with about 30 years of combined flying experience and nearly 3,000 combined flying hours.

Bloomingdale and Gard were life partners who jointly owned Willie Air Tours, a sightseeing business they operated in Provincetown in summer and in Florida during the winter. They invested in a 1973 Rockwell Shrike Commander twin-engine aircraft for their upcoming world tour.

A veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps and a retired National Guard Major, Guard was the more experienced flier of the two women. Although Bloomingdale, the co-pilot of the flying duo, did not get her license until she was 50, she was an active pilot in and member of the Eastern New England Ninety Nines Chapter.

The duo had planned to record their race live on a Web cam after Bloomingdale's two grandchildren told her they had followed the Iditarod, the dog-sled race, on the Internet.

ABCNEWS' Phuong Nguyen in Washington contributed to this story.