Tegucigalpa, Honduras—1984
T
here were two South African bush pilots at the controls of the C-7 Caribou as it turned on final for a landing at Tegucigalpa’s Toncontin Airport. They were goosing the turbo-props like hot-rodders, anxious to get back on the ground and out for a few beers after a long-haul from San Jose, with only a pit-stop to piss and refuel at Ilopango military air base in El Salvador. They were gliding toward the runway used by all civil aviation flights coming into the Honduran capitol, but when they had the gear on the deck, any similarity to a standard international arrival would end.
Their aircraft carried the licenses and bore the paint scheme of Southern Air, an outfit headquartered in Charleston, South Carolina that was nominally engaged in ferrying freight in an
