Steve Fossett confirmed dead

The remains of Steve Fossett have been identified more than a year after he disappeared

Tests carried out on bones found near the crash site of the plane flown by Steve Fossett have confirmed that they belong to the 63-year old adventurer.

Fossett disappeared on 3 September 2007 after he borrowed a plane to investigate some land. The wreckage was found last month and crash investigators estimate that he mistakenly flew into a mountain at around 10,000ft.

"I am hopeful that the DNA identification puts a definitive end to all of the speculation surrounding Steve's death," said his widow Peggy.

"This has been an incredibly difficult time for me, and I am thankful to everyone who helped bring closure to this tragedy. I now await the conclusion of the National Transportation Safety Board investigation and findings into the cause of the crash."

The search for Fossett rallied some of the biggest names in the technology industry, not to mention hundreds of planes and individuals who scoured 17,000 square miles of desert to find clues.

Google got behind the search by releasing fresh satellite images of the area on Google Earth, and Amazon enlisted its Mechanical Turk search engine which uses humans to examine individual sites for data.