Philadelphia Inquirer co-owner Lewis Katz was killed along with six other people in a fiery plane crash in Massachusetts, it has been revealed.
The incidents happens just days after reaching a deal that many hoped would end months of infighting at the newspaper and restore it to its former glory.
His son, Drew, and a business partner confirmed Katz's death in a crash of a Gulfstream IV private jet, which went down on takeoff Saturday night from Hanscom Field outside Boston on its way to Atlantic City, New Jersey.
Katz and others were returning from an event at the home of Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Doris Kearns Goodwin. There were no survivors, People magazine reported.
On Tuesday, Katz and Harold H.F. "Gerry" Lenfest struck a deal to gain full control of the Inquirer as well as the Philadelphia Daily News and Philly.com by buying out their co-owners for 88 million dollars - an agreement that ended a very public feud over the Inquirer's business and journalism direction.