By Dan Klepal
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Emily Argo, 25, was killed in a plane crash Sunday off the coast of Florida.

Emily Argo is coming home.

The 25-year-old Taylor High School graduate died Sunday when the twin-engine plane she was riding in crashed into the Atlantic Ocean about eight miles off the Florida coast. The plane was found Wednesday, with her body in the fuselage.

Argo was on a whale-spotting expedition with two other biologists and the pilot. There were no survivors.

A memorial service will be at 2 p.m. Sunday in the Westwood United Methodist Church, 3460 Epworth Ave. A private burial will be next week.

The Nassau County Sheriff's Office found the plane in about 65 feet of water. The bodies of pilot Tom Hinds, 40, of Fernandina Beach, Fla., and researcher Michael Newcomer, 49, of Los Altos, Calif., were in the plane with Argo. The body of a third researcher, 47-year-old Jackie Ciano, of Massachusetts, was found near the crash site Sunday.

U.S. Coast Guard officials plan to raise the plane off the ocean floor today.

Emily Argo's father, Dan Argo of Cheviot, said the family continued to hold out hope this week.

"We've been through the ups and downs," Dan Argo said. "We've had unbelievable support from family and friends through it all. We held out hope ... but with the information we had received, we felt that once the plane was recovered, Emily would be recovered at that time."

Emily Argo was a project coordinator for Wildlife Trust, a nonprofit agency. She was valedictorian of her 1995 graduating class at Taylor High School, and a regular member of the dean's list at Ohio Northern University in Ada.

E-mail dklepal@enquirer.com