At least one person was confirmed dead in a small plane crash on Thursday in a lagoon in the Redwood Shores area in the U.S. state of California, local authorities said.

The plane, a twin-engine Beech 65 Queen Air, crashed around 11: 51 a.m. local time, just 30 seconds after taking off from San Carlos Airport, located about 30 kilometers south of San Francisco.

The body of a woman in her 40s has been pulled out of the water and rescuers believed more people may have been aboard the plane.

"It was quiet and then all of a sudden it sounded like a dive bomb followed by a deep thud," Josh Butler, who saw the crash from his office, told Xinhua.

"When we looked up we saw it upside down in the water and as it sunk, pieces from inside the cockpit were floating around outside in a big oil slick," Butler said.

According to authorities, divers are still searching for two others who may have been on the plane. It is still unclear what may have caused the crash.