A Life Wasted

Bahamas

Mom's next boy friend was Tony something. Tony owned a large construction company and at the time had a large project going on in Savannah and another in Freeport, Bahamas. I don't recall too much about Tony other than the fact that he drove a Cadillac convertible and that he flew mom and me to the Bahamas. This would have been early 1968, so I was eleven. I don't know who owned all the planes, but I recall we flew from Savannah to Fort Lauderdale in a single engine Cessna, then transferred to a light twin for the trip across the water to the Bahamas.

Joking with me, Tony pointed out a small two seat aircraft and explained that we would take it across the ocean. He also told me the Bahamas didn't allow kids to enter at night so I would have to hide in the back of the airplane and sneak through customs. While they were taking care of the transfer between planes, I went exploring. When they were ready to leave I couldn't be found.

The beginning of a trend in my life. When they eventually found me I was hiding in the back of the plane Tony told me I'd have to hide in. We were late taking off so no one thought his little joke on me was funny. But it gets better. Though this subject didn't come up again during the short flight, it was foremost on my mind. The Freeport Customs area looked like a grocery store check out registers with multiple stations. There were a half dozen of the stations to accommodate airline flights, but as we where a small private plane there was just one stall open. The pilot went first, followed by Tony, then mom. While the Pilot was talking to the customs officers I slipped through one of the unused stations. When they finally started looking for me, thinking I was in the pre-clearance area, they all looked back. I had to step out from a door frame to get their attention. I'd already cleared customs. Mom thought it was cute, but the Bohemian customs officers didn't think it was so funny.

We stayed in Tony's house which was pretty cool. I saw my first iguana the next morning while taking out the trash. The thing looked like a miniature dragon. Its hard to believe that a kid who played with poisonous snakes and swam with an alligator would be startled by a two foot long iguana, but I was. The thing scared the crap out of me. After Tony explained what it was and that it was harmless I stopped being scared of them, but I never caught one nor played with them. They were simply too prehistoric looking for me to be comfortable around.

I went to my first casino there and fell in love with the lights and sounds of gambling. I swam in the crystal clear Caribbean waters, saw a small school of barracuda and generally had a great time. When it was time to go home Tony had to stay and work, so it was Mom and I in the light twin engine airplane with the pilot. Mom sat in the co-pilot's seat. Exhausted from a great week, I stretched out across the back seat just after take off and went to sleep.

While I slept we ran into a vicious storm over the ocean. From mom's account I know that the pilot had just told her to wake me so I could strap in when we hit a major wind sheer. We dropped more than a thousand feet in an instant. I went from a deep sleep across the back seats to a jarring awakening splattered against the ceiling of the aircraft. Gravity being what it is, my return to the seats was far more forceful. No one had to tell me to put my seat belt on.

The plane was damaged in that violent drop. The control panel lights were destroyed, so the pilot couldn't see anything, and the co-pilot's door, the plane's only door, had busted and wouldn't latch. So while I was strapping myself in the pilot was trying to locate his flashlight and mom was fighting to secure an open door. Mom soon realized that the slip stream pressure wasn't going to allow the door to open more than an inch or so, so she let go of the handle and helped the pilot locate his flashlight. Once the flashlight was located she held it for him so he could see the panel and fly the plane. Everything seemed to be working except the panel lights and the door latch. As uncomfortable as the noise and wind from the open door was, it didn't threaten our safety.

The flashlight operation was a bit dangerous. It was just a penlight that only illuminated a small area, and mom knew nothing about the control panel and its instruments, so it was difficult for the pilot to explain where to shine the light. His struggle to keeping the wings straight and level required both hands and his full attention. He couldn't hold the flashlight or even point at the instrument he wanted to see. So he would shout, "Altimeter and mom would say, "What the hell is that? "And he would say, the round one, to which mom would point out that were all round. It was an amazing display of both piloting skills' and patience that got us through the storm and to Florida, but somehow we made it.

We were supposed to clear U.S. Customs at Fort Lauderdale, but with every airliner in the sky seeking safety from the monstrous storm that runway was full. Normally we would have had to wait in line to land, but with the lights out and the broken door the pilot declared an emergency so we were allowed to land at an alternate airport, West Palm Beach, which was a smaller facility that lacked 24 U.S. Customs services. The landing itself was incredibly dangerous, with the strong cross winds and the pilot's inability to monitor his instruments properly. It wasn't until after I became a pilot myself that I fully appreciated that pilot's skill. We easily could have died on that landing.

When Air Traffic Control diverted us to West Palm Beach we were instructed to call customs by phone when we landed. When the pilot complied with this Customs instructed him and his passengers to stay at the FBO (Fixed Based Operator, the company that services planes and has facilities on the air field) until morning when customs agents would arrive to inspect the aircraft. The weather prevented us from leaving, but a hotel room would have been welcome. Instead we had to camp in the lobby of a small-FBO.

I waited until both mom and the pilot had fallen to sleep, then went exploring. By this time the rain had stopped but the winds threatened to blow me away. There were lots of airplanes tied down outside that I wanted to check out but that wind made it dangerous to walk around. It didn't take me long to find a large hanger with an unlocked door. Inside I found plenty to play with. There were a hand full of small planes, but there were two big private jets. One of them was locked up tight, but the other was not. It's door was closed, and it was not easy to figure out how to get into the thing, but I did figure it out. I don't recall what kind of jet it was, but it had eight very comfortable seats in the back plus the pilot and co-pilot's seats. I of course went straight to the pilot's seat and pretended I was flying through a bad storm. It was particularly realistic after I figured out how to turn on the master electronics switch, and then the radio. With the control-panel of the million dollar jet lit up and the radio blaring ATC instructions to real planes, I was lost in another world. There I fell asleep to be woke at day break by a rather upset charter pilot.