LOS ANGELES, Oct 2, 2008 (AFP) - The mangled wreckage of the plane being flown by adventurer Steve Fossett when he disappeared has been found, police said Thursday, but there was no sign of the millionaire's body.

Madera County Sheriff John Anderson said the shattered remains of Fossett's single-engine Bellanca were spotted during an aerial search of the rugged Sierra Nevada mountains in California late Wednesday.

Rescuers later reached the plane on foot and confirmed it was Fossett's aircraft, which Anderson said had ploughed into the mountainside at high speed.

'The crash looked so severe I doubt if someone would have walked away from it,' Anderson told reporters. 'There was no body in the plane. We have not found any human remains at the crash site.'

National Transportation and Safety Board official Mark Rosenker said preliminary analysis of the site indicated Fossett had died in the crash.

'That information is indicative of a high-impact crash, which appears to be consistent with a non-survivable accident,' he said, adding it would likely take 'weeks, perhaps months' before the cause of the accident was determined.

Later Thursday the sheriff's department declined to confirm reports citing Rosenker as saying human remains had been recovered from the wreck and sent for analysis. 'There isn't any information I can give on that,' a spokeswoman said.

Fossett's widow, Peggy, meanwhile welcomed the discovery of her husband's plane. 'The uncertainty surrounding my husband's death over this past year has created a very difficult situation for me,' she said. 'I hope now to be able to bring to closure a very painful chapter in my life.'

Fossett vanished on September 3 last year after taking off on a solo flight from a private airstrip in neighboring Nevada.

Anderson said search teams were racing against time with snowstorms forecast in the region. 'If it in fact snows, that's going to obliterate any hope of finding the remains or further evidence,' Anderson said.

Rescue teams had started combing the area near Mammoth Lakes on Wednesday after the discovery of aviation identity cards bearing Fossett's name, a faded fleece sweatshirt and 1,005 dollars cash.

Anderson said the crash site was roughly a quarter of a mile from where the identity cards and cash were found by a hiker.

Fossett's disappearance had baffled rescuers who found no trace of the 63-year-old adventurer despite a massive search that involved dozens of aircraft taking to the skies to scour the region.

A multi-millionaire who made his fortune dealing stocks in Chicago, Fossett set dozens of world records in sailboats, gliders and hot-air balloons.

He famously made the first solo nonstop, non-refueled circumnavigation of the world in 67 hours in the Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer. In 2002, he was the first person to fly solo around the world in a balloon.

Fossett's iconic status and the unusual circumstances around his demise have brought comparisons to the enduring question of what happened to aviator Amelia Earhart, who vanished over the Pacific Ocean in 1937.

Fossett's friend and fellow adventurer, British tycoon Sir Richard Branson, said he hoped the discoveries would lay to rest conspiracy theories surrounding the case following reports earlier this year he may have faked his death.

'The positive thing is that today, a couple of stories that have appeared in the press, they'll be put to rest once and for all, and everybody who was close to Steve will have the chance now to pay the right tribute to what was a truly great and extraordinary person,' Branson told Sky News television.