Mississippi and Alabama authorities have suspended the air and ground search for a downed plane and its pilot who left Greenville on Friday due to bad weather.

Searches were suspended at approximately 1:27 p.m., according to The Meridian Star.

“We only have a four-hundred foot ceiling and to send aircraft up to search in this weather might result in more than one search and rescue operation,” Capt. Alan Sayre, with Mississippi Civil Air Patrol told The Star on Monday. “We haven’t given up hope in finding the plane and pilot. We just have to be careful in how we do this so we don’t put other live in jeopardy.”


The pilot has been identified as Monty Hudson, a professional crop duster. Hudson a Jonesboro, Ark., native was returning home and was scheduled to refuel in Cleveland, Miss., family members told some sources.

Officials with the Civil Air Patrol said radar last picked up Hudson’s plane – described as a yellow and blue AT 602 Air Tracker Air Craft – on Friday near Livingston, Ala.

Livingston is 40 miles northeast of Meridian.