Trafficking

[Blue]

Saw the story of Rik Luytjes and his "Air America" Cocaine Smuggling ring of the early/mid 80's on Court TV awhile ago. I did some research, and picked up the book Trafficking, which tells the Air America story. Pretty interesting read about a guy who ran, as he called it, the "Federal Express" of cocaine smuggling. Using piston twins with long range tanks and STOL mods, he flew non-stop from Columbia to Pennsylvania, making up to a million bucks a load.



Never got caught during any of the smuggling ops, but got ratted out by an accomplice.



Anyway, interesting read.

 

[MTpilot]

All that time and he can't log a minute of it!

 

[Ollie]

Sounds very cool. Who is the author?

 

[Blue]

Berkeley Rice.

 

[FN FAL]

Did you guys read the news today? A military pilot and one of his flight crew got busted for bringing 'ecstasy' into the country...this wasn't thier first trip smuggling drugs either.

 

[T-REX]

I used to fly with the guy that was featured in the show about 2 years ago. As far as I know he's still flying freight around the northeast. Nobody happened to tape it did they?

 

[414Flyer]

There was a C-172 with long range tanks that flew from Mexico over the gulf, and up into the NE. Customs tried to follow, but the 172 just kept going and going...He never was caught.

 

[YGBSM]

All that time and he can't log a minute of it!

Yep, his chances for getting that $22,000 a year Comair job are probably pretty slim.

 

[T-REX]

He had over 17,000 hours when he stopped logging about 10 yrs ago. So I dont think hes woried about a few hundred hours in pistons. Plus the whole age 60 thing.

 

[urflyingme?!]

There was an article about a guy who was a fish spotter turned drug smuggler. Was this him?