Canoeists on a dwindling lake in the Panhandle region of the U.S. state of Texas have discovered a small plane that crashed in 1984.

Park Service workers closed the area around the wreckage so they can investigate.

A wheel from the plane and a jacket believed to have been the pilot's were found floating on Lake Meredith in the two days following the crash which killed the 25-year-old pilot and a passenger.

But according to a report by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), a six-day dive turned up nothing else.

The lake about 20 miles north of the city of Amarillo is at just 8 percent of its capacity.