(Updates with tour operator confirming three dead)

NAROK, Kenya, July 3 (Reuters) - A small plane flying to Kenya's Masai Mara game reserve crashed on Tuesday and three people were killed, a tour operator said.

The dead were two passengers on a safari holiday, both Germans living in Switzerland, and the Kenyan pilot, said Will Jones, managing director of British-based tour operator Journeys by Design, which organised the holiday.

Names and other details were not immediately released.

The Cessna 182, chartered from a Nairobi-based company, crashed during a flight from Nairobi to the Masai Mara game reserve.

"There were no survivors," Journeys by Design said in a statement, adding that a director of the company was flying to Nairobi on Tuesday evening.

Kenyan police said earlier three people were feared dead after a plane crashed in the Loita Hills, near the Masai Mara.

Accident investigators were on their way to the scene to recover the wreckage, said Narok district police boss Patrick Wambani.

The road from Nairobi to the Masai Mara, home of lions, cheetahs, elephants, zebra and wildebeests, is in poor condition and many tourists opt to fly there rather than drive.

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