The Flight to Bolivia Story

1963

A true story

Written 1/2019* 1,064 Words

By Howard Yasgar

In 1963, I was working in Stamford Connecticut along with my good friend Lou Gladstein.

Lou was a used car expert and I was learning the fine art of working in the used car business.

It wasn’t long before I noticed that whenever Lou ran across a Ford Taurus, he would buy it and have it shipped to Miami Florida.

One day, we had just returned from a New York buying trip, and Lou had bought a Ford Taurus.

Lou said, “Pack a bag, we are going to Miami. I want to introduce you to the customer that’s buying all the Ford Taurus’s”.

At the time in 1963 my mother was leasing a 24-room hotel located on Collins Avenue on Miami Beach.

So, I thought making a trip to Miami was a good idea, as it would give me a chance to see my mom.

On the day we were leaving, Lou put a cardboard carton into our car behind the front seat.

I knew what was in the carton, there were 8 very used revolvers that Lou had bought from various street people in the Stamford and New York city area. I knew he had paid around $10.00 each.

Lou had a special way about him; it was like a type of magnetism. For some reason Lou attracted all kinds of strange street people that just loved doing business with him.

We left Stamford Connecticut and about 30 hours later, we were at the Miami Airport Inn, having breakfast with two of Lou’s customers.

When Lou introduced them to me, they said they both were pilots.

They also said they owned and flew an older C-46 airplane that they used to smuggle goods weekly into the country of Bolivia.

They had an office and warehouse right across the street from the restaurant, it was located at the MIAD warehouse section of Miami International Airport.

Turns out it was not only where their office was, but it was also where they parked their airplane.

During breakfast they handed Lou a fat envelope, I assumed it was a cash payment for the Ford Taurus Lou had just shipped to them.

They explained to me that the Taurus automobile was small enough to fit inside their aircraft and they smuggled it into La Paz Bolivia every time Lou sent one.

Lou rented a room for us at the restaurant’s hotel, and we agreed to meet the pilots at their office the next day.

The Pilots said they were loading up their plane as we spoke, and they said we could fly to Bolivia with them the next evening if we wanted to.

I mentioned that I hadn’t brought a passport, they said none was necessary, as they already took care of paying everyone off at the airport.

The next day we drove across the street into the MIAD warehouse section of the airport, and finding their office was easy.

Lou carried in the cardboard box with the 8 very used pistols in it, the pilots took a quick look and gave Lou $400.00 in cash. I knew Lou had only paid around $10.00 each, when he bought them.

I couldn’t help but notice that both the pilot’s office and their warehouse were filled with all kinds of stuff that they were packing into the airplane that was parked outside.

The Ford Taurus had already been loaded and they were just closing the cargo door as we walked onto the tarmac outside of the warehouse.

I didn’t know much about aircraft back then, but their plane looked very old, and I couldn’t help but notice that oil was dripping from one engine.

Lou said he wanted to go with them to Bolivia, but I said I wanted to go and see my mother at her hotel on Miami Beach.

Lou gave me the keys to the car, and he also gave me $500.00 in cash, he said it was my share of the sale of the Ford Taurus and the guns.

We agreed that Lou would call me at my mother’s hotel when they returned from Bolivia in a couple of days.

Four days passed, and I didn’t hear anything from Lou.

I became concerned and I drove to their airport warehouse, but it was all locked up.

A neighbor said it was very unusual for them not to have returned in four days.

I called my mother’s hotel to see if Lou had called, and my mother said yes, he had.

She said Lou was at the same hotel across the Street from the airport, and I should come and pick him up, and he would tell me everything that had happened.

Lou told me, they were flying at night through the pitch-black Bolivian mountains. They were intending to land at the La Paz airport, just like they had done hundreds of times before.

It was a dark night and they were flying by instruments only, although Lou said not all the instruments were working.

Suddenly, one of the plane’s engines caught fire.

Lou said everyone immediately knew the plane was going to crash and they would all be killed.

Lou said he was just holding onto the back of the pilot’s seat, and they were all praying.

Then the pilot yelled at them to hurry up and push the car out of the plane.

The copilot opened the cargo door as he unhooked the cargo straps, and Lou released the car’s emergency brake.

Then, with super- human strength Lou and the copilot lifted and pushed the Taurus until it rolled out of the cargo door of the plane, along with some of the other cargo.

Lou said as the car went out the door, the plane suddenly lurched forward and tilted, it was losing altitude and Lou thought they both would fall out the cargo door with the car. But they hung onto the cargo straps as the pilot leveled the plane as they made their approach to the airport.

Lou said he was so nervous that he couldn’t breathe when they landed in the thin air of Bolivia. So, at the airport they gave him oxygen and then rushed him to a hospital.

The pilot’s Bolivian friends got Lou a flight back to Miami on another smuggler’s airplane, while they both stayed in Bolivia to tend to the airplane’s engine.

Lou said, “Never again”.

He said, “Probably one day, someone will find that Ford Taurus on a mountain top in Bolivia”, and say aliens put it there.