PIPESTONE — A family friend said two teenagers from Mexico who were killed, along with the pilot, in the crash of a small airplane in southwestern Minnesota were visiting relatives and wanted to take a plane ride before returning home.

Fifty-nine-year-old Steven Christiansen was giving the teens a ride in his homebuilt plane on Monday night when it crashed into a cornfield near Holland in Pipestone County and killed all three.

Christiansen’s longtime friend, 82-year-old Grant Volsch, said the teens were related to Christensen’s daughter-in-law, Brisa. Volsch said Seth and Brisa Christiansen recently had a baby, so Brisa’s 18-year-old brother, Marcos Favela, of Torrean, Mexico, and a 13-year-old female relative from Guadalajara, Mexico, had been visiting.

Volsch said Christensen helped build the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Sioux Falls, South Dakota about 15 years ago.