Cherokee Archer N25626

An example of how big the Triangle can be to investigators comes from another disappearance, that of Archer N25626. On August 19, 1998, British subject Paul Baxter rented it at Titusville, Florida, for a trip to nearby Grand Bahama. However, it seems Baxter changed destinations. The plane was last clocked in as leaving Matthew Town, Great Inagua, for Kingston, Jamaica. There the plane never arrived.

     The owner became worried when the plane didn’t return. He started
         investigations on August 24. To his surprise he found out
           that his plane had been searched for as missing en route to
           Jamaica on the 19th. All areas from from Haiti to the
               Bahamas had been alerted but no sign of the plane
               he learned had ever been found.

               It is true that Baxter didn’t have permission to fly the plane
             beyond nearby Grand Bahama. This may simply have been
             a lie on his part in order to go to Jamaica with 3 friends,
             knowing that many aircraft leasers do not like their plane to
         go too far, especially into the Caribbean and near Cuba; and then
       there are insurance premiums for which Baxter may not have been
       able to afford for such a long flight.

     In any case it seems that it was not an intentional disappearance. He and his 3 friends wanted to go to Jamaica for vacation, and no harm was intended. He planned to have the plane back by August 24, as he promised. There was no weather complications of any kind. (The web version of the Brief is rather lame in saying that satellites showed cloud cover possibly meaning convective activity; convective activity can be easily ascertained as well as its level.) Cuba was even asked to look for the plane. Ramp checks all throughout Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and the Bahamas turned up no sign of the plane.

     Its 4 passengers were entered in to the rolls of “missing” —a nebulous fate shared by so many out there.