Nevada Billing Fossett's Widow for Search

By The Associated Press

posted: 01 May 2008 4:29 p..m. ET

: An Army Blackhawk helicopter prepares to take off from Minden Airport, in Minden, Nev., to join in the search for multi-millionaire aviator and adventurer Steve Fossett on Sept. 5, 2007. Fossett vanished in a landscape of soaring peaks and sagebrush desert notorious for winds so powerful and tricky they can swirl an airplane like a leaf and shear off a wing. Neither Fossett nor his aircraft were ever found and an Illinois judge declared him dead on Feb. 15, 2008. Fossett left an eight-figure estate and now Nevada Governor Jim Gibbons plans to bill Fossett's widow for most of the costs of the month-long search. Credit: AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli

CARSON CITY, Nevada (AP) — Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons intends to bill the widow of missing multimillionaire adventurer Steve Fossett for $687,000 the state spent in searching for the famed aviator last fall, a spokesman said.

Gibbons spokesman Ben Kieckhefer told the Las Vegas Review-Journal it was his understanding that the governor will bill Peggy Fossett for costs of the unsuccessful search.

Fossett, 63, took off Sept. 3 from Barron Hilton's Flying M Ranch in a small plane on what was supposed to be a short pleasure flight. During a month-long search, ground crews, the Nevada National Guard and the Civil Air Patrol scoured a 20,000-square-mile (51,800-square-kilometer) area, but turned up no sign of Fossett or his plane.

Hilton, the hotel magnate, later voluntarily sent the state a check $200,000 to cover some of the search costs.

Fossett was declared legally dead Feb. 15 by an Illinois judge. In making that determination, Cook County Circuit Court Judge Jeffery Malak said Fossett left a "vast," eight-figure estate.

Billing someone for the costs of a search is unusual.