Category: My Big Family Stories

They met at First Baptist Church –the lawyer, the mother whose son was missing, and my brother — at 11 p.m., said goodbye to her parents, and headed to Charlotte Douglas International Airport in Brother Dave’s Bronco.

The weather forecast was good, better than good — it would be pristine for the entire four hour, 15 minute flight to Houston. Even so, Dave had an extra hour’s worth of fuel, plenty of fuel to get to an alternate airport if the forecast was wrong.

My brother planned to fly his Beech Baron 55, a twin-engine aircraft, from Charlotte to just north of Atlanta and then to Montgomery, AL, Baton Rouge, LA, and on to William P. Hobby Airport in Houston. The Baron had a cruising speed of about 200 miles per hour at 10,000 feet and with no wind.

After the three of them settled into the plane Dave pressed the button on the mike.

“Charlotte ground, this is November four five four zero Sugar at Thurston with the numbers, taxi please.”

Translation: The Baron’s assigned number was N4540S, they were at a hanger called “Thurston,” and Dave already knew about the active runway, barometric pressure, wind velocity and direction and was ready to taxi.

A few minutes later Charlotte tower cleared the Baron for takeoff.

Dave pushed two throttles forward as far as they would go, started his stopwatch and noted the time, 11:45 p.m. He had already been awake almost 19 hours.

“Hello, Charlotte depart, 40 sugar climbing to 4,000 on two seven five.”

They were on their way.

When they passed the Vulcan VOR, an electronic navigation point in Birmingham, AL, Dave noticed that he was almost 15 minutes behind schedule. There was more head wind that he had been told to expect.

By the time they got to Baton Rouge they were 28 minutes behind schedule –28 of the 60 minutes of reserve fuel had been used — but the alarm bells didn’t go off in Dave’s head. Maybe he was just too tired.

He should have landed and refueled but he didn’t.

Continued tomorrow.

Anne hung up the phone and called Tim, a young attorney in her circle of friends at First Baptist Church in Charlotte.

It was after 5 but Tim was still in his office, working.

“I know where Bob is,” she told him. “I have an address.”

Tim said he needed a couple of hours to think about what they ought to do, that he would call her back.

Tim verified the address Anne had given him, in Houston, TX, and considered their options. He filled three yellow pages with notes, airline schedules — and discarded plans. And then, at 9:30, Tim canceled his appointments for the next couple of days and dialed my brother’s telephone number.

Brother Dave was a pilot and he owned a plane.

Dave had been up since 5 a.m. He had put in a day at his “box shop,” Queen City Container, and was about to go to bed. But he took the call. He knew Tim –Dave also belonged to First Baptist — and Anne. And he knew Anne’s ex had taken their son and disappeared.

“I thought you might like to go with us to get Britt, or rather allow us to go with you to get Britt,” Tim said.

“Do you mean sometime this week?” Dave asked.

“I mean tonight, right now, in the next hour or two.”

Dave had one question: If they could find the boy, and grab him, would that be legal or illegal?

“A little bit of both I suppose but it’s something we should do,” Tim said.

“Deal me in,” my brother said.

Continued tomorrow.