I got lost in the bermuda triange in my airplane, mooney n9493v.

I have never before publicly told this true story, which happened on August 2, 1985.

the adventure happened when i was a young lawyer

I am only first publicly telling this true story after I have retired from my aviation and business litigation practice. I was afraid that, had I written this story as a young lawyer, it would have damaged my career because some people might think that I am crazy, or that I made this all up and thus I am a liar. Since I am retired, I no longer care what people think about my true story.

So much time has passed since the flight (almost 35 years) that I may get some of the details wrong, due to the vagaries of memory and the passage of significant amounts of time.

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lost in the bermuda triangle in mooney n9493v, flying from f

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I had just started falling in love with a beautiful, sexy and nice woman named Christine ("Chris"). I had taken her flying locally a few times in my 4-seat, single-engine (200 HP), 175 mph airplane, a 1970 Mooney M20E, which was well equipped with instruments and radios suitable for flight in instrument flight conditions (i.e., blind, navigating solely by reference to the aircraft instruments and radios). The airplane was based at Burke Lakefront Airport in Cleveland, Ohio. I was a young (age 33) pilot, with a Commercial Pilot Certificate and an Instrument Rating issued by the Federal Aviation Administration. I had also recently been fired after two years as an associate attorney at a fancy, stodgy, old-time downtown Cleveland civil defense litigation law firm with a significant book of business in aviation litigation, where I defended airlines and aircraft manufacturers in civil litigation. Before the Cleveland law firm, I had worked as a Trial Attorney in the Office of the Chief Counsel for the Federal Aviation Administration in Washington, DC, defending the FAA employees (mostly air traffic controllers) in plane crash litigation. I was just starting to set up my own sole practitioner law practice. Thus, I had plenty of time on my hands to court and try to impress Chris.

I invited Chris to go island hopping with me in the Mooney for a couple of weeks, visiting several islands in the Caribbean Sea. She readily accepted my invitation. It promised to be a fun vacation.

In preparation for the flight, I took additional flight training in flight procedures which I expected to use during the flight. I had all of the avionics (aircraft radios and instruments) inspected and tested and tweaked and adjusted by a skilled avionics technician, changed the oil in the airplane, made sure that all aircraft maintenance and aircraft records were up to date, gathered our passports, studied procedures for flying to and between Caribbean Islands, rented a survival raft for the over-water parts of the trip, stuffed my wallet with $20 bills and credit cards, packed the plane, and set off on our grand Caribbean adventure.

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