The three aviators of a twin-engine radar plane that crashed Wednesday off the coast of North Carolina have been declared dead, the Navy announced Friday.

Mike Maus, a spokesman with the Norfolk-based Atlantic Fleet Naval Air Force, said that search crews have found debris from the E-2C Hawkeye turboprop plane, but they have not found the bodies of the aviators. Maus said the search has been terminated.

The Navy identified those aboard as Lt. Cameron Hall, 30, of Natchitoches, La; Lt. j.g. Jerry Smith, 25, of Greenville, Maine; and Lt. Ryan Betton, 31, of Collinsville.

Betton lived in Suffolk with his wife and 2-year-old son, but grew up in Henry County and attended Fieldale-Collinsville High School. He graduated from Virginia Military Institute in 1998.

Betton's father, Collinsville optician Dr. Wally Betton, said Saturday his son's love of flying started at an early age, when they attended an air show at Fort Polk, La.

"One of the pilots picked him up and put him inside the plane," Betton said. "I've got a picture of him in the jet when he was 8. He loved to fly. He turned down a job in the Navy that would have taken him away from flying just so he could keep flying."

Betton said that on the day he called his middle son, Aaron, to tell him of the accident, Aaron's wife was in the process of delivering her first child.

"They named him after Ryan."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.