MIAMI - A private airplane crashed into the Gulf of Mexico off the Florida coast Saturday night, with two people confirmed dead and a third person believed to have been on the flight missing.

Authorities in Venice initiated a search Sunday after 10 a.m. following a Federal Aviation Administration inquiry to the Venice Municipal Airport about an overdue single-engine Piper Cherokee that had not returned to its origin airport in St. Petersburg.

Around the same time, recreational boaters found the body of a woman floating about 2.5 miles west of the Venice shore, city of Venice spokesperson Lorraine Anderson said in a statement.

Divers from the Sarasota County Sheriff's Office located the wreckage of the rented airplane around 2 p.m. about a third of a mile offshore, directly west of the Venice airport, Anderson said.

Rescuers found a deceased girl in the plane's passenger area. A third person, believed to be a male who was the pilot or a passenger, remained missing Sunday, Anderson said.