Fly By Night Midnight Flyer Media

In Part 1 of "How Are You Still Alive?" you met pilot Billy Dekle of Florida, a flyer who cheated death more than once as he brought in tons of Colombian marijuana, not in large cargo planes, but in smaller singles and twins.
In Part 2, his story continues with a tragic accident that cost a man his life, and with a flight that ended with a long glide back to a shore in Mexico after an engine failure. And then Billy Dekle's final arrest and the harsh mandatory sentences of the time that put him in prison for life.
Along the way you meet his wife Kay who against great odds, keep their family together for the many years he was in prison, and the Florida lawman who arrested him, ending his years on the run. And you'll hear from his brother Bob who was serving as a prosecutor, including at the trial of America's most famous serial killer. And he was doing so while his younger brother was flying loads of pot into Florida.
You''ll hear how the support of advocacy organizations and a presidential act of mercy returned his freedom.
For a detailed history of those years, read Billy & Kay Dekle's book "Flying High With Gringo Billy, available on Amazon.
 
Thanks to Billy & Kay Dekle, Bob Dekle and Ed Hudson for sharing their stories in this episode. Retired police officer Ed Hudson has also written a book about his arrest of Billy's partner, the late Freddie Crow, and how he later befriended Crow after Crow was released from prison. You'll find Ed Hudson's book "As The Crow Flies: The Redemption of an International Drug Smuggler" available on Amazon.

There are pilots who made millions smuggling and then walked away from the danger and the risk. Some invested their wealth in legitimate businesses and real estate; others blew it on expensive toys and partying. We will never know how many got away with it...because most of those pilots have kept their stories to themselves.
 
But there are some who have shared their stories for all to hear, and in this episode (the first of two on his story), you'll hear how Billy Dekle made his millions and lost them. You'll hear how he survived flights that others didn't, and when his career as a smuggler came crashing down, Billy went to prison for life.
Billy's story continues in Episode 12 How Are You Still Alive? Part 2.
For a detailed account of his life as a smuggler, and how that affected his family, check out "Flying High With Gringo Billy" written by Billy and his wife Kay, available here on Amazon.
 
 

Most drug smuggling pilots were eventually caught. Many went to prison, and when they did, they often lost everything they had. But then again, most didn't start with the wealth and connections of a Palm Beach pilot-the rich kid who made a fortune flying drugs into the United states, and then got away.
When pilot George Williams followed his wealthy father to a new home in Palm Beach, what appeared to be a chance encounter at a local airport proved to be a life-changing moment. That's the day he decided to become an international drug smuggler. Later, another apparent chance encounter on a dusty airport in Honduras would eventually provide his "get out of jail free card".
With his piloting skills and his openness to adventure, George Williams has led a charmed life. It's a life story he tells  (under his assumed name) in his book "Snow on the Palms".
"Snow on the Palms" is available on Amazon.

From the body of a parachutist found in a driveway in Tennessee, to the body of a black bear found in the woods of Georgia, the long strange tale of a narcotics cop turned narcotics smuggling pilot lives on nearly thirty eight years since his death.
In this episode, Fly By Night returns to the story we told in our first four episodes to provide additional information from those who knew Drew Thornton (seen here with his younger brother Tim).
If you are not already familiar with the fascinating story of Thornton, take some time to listen to the first four episodes of this podcast.
In this episode you'll hear from Rab Hagin, a childhood friend of Drew Thornton who witnessed the beginnings of Thornton's impressive transformation, and in an exclusive interview, you'll hear from Drexel Neal, a retired Lexington police detective who saw a side of Thornton that differs greatly from the myth.
And, you'll hear from Robert Palumbo, the producer and director of  a network documentary that tells the real story not told in the 2023 movie, Cocaine Bear.

In the 1960's, 70's and 80's, a group of Southern Californians turned to smuggling to finance and build a counter culture community. But they hadn't started out as enlightened hippies. Before one long strange night of transformation, they had been petty criminals, more interested in stealing than in peace and love. After their 180 degree change, they became known as the "Brotherhood of Eternal Love" and were known for selling hash from Afghanistan, and for practically giving away hundreds of thousands of tabs of "Orange Sunshine" LSD, even dropping thousands of tabs from a Cessna flying over a festival. They had communal homes in California and later in Hawaii, and in the waning years of the Brotherhood's smuggling operations, that's where DEA Agent Kelly Snyder first encountered a pilot named Randy Garrett. By coincidence, their paths would later cross in Louisville, Kentucky, and their story has an unusual end.
The second story in this episode is that of Wally Thrasher of Virginia, a charismatic pilot whose skills were much in demand, and who was living a good life until everything came apart when someone else crashed a plane he owned, and law enforcement agents began to close in on him. Thrasher's attempts to recover from the loss of a great deal of money and drugs that burned in the crash would led to his own mysterious disappearance, with theories of his death in another crash, possible murder, and even a well-financed change of identity and a life on the run.
To tell his story, we have a special guest presenter, three-time national aerobatic champion and member of the National Aviation Hall of Fame, Patty Wagstaff.

For a time, pilot Jim Thurman lived a double life: corporate and charter pilot by day, and sometimes at night, a drug smuggler. After quickly working his way through the certificates and ratings he needed as a young pilot in the Atlanta area, Thurman began to fly larger, cargo sized aircraft hauling legitimate loads like auto parts. On the charter side, he even flew a well-known U. S. senator on his way to a meeting with a Central American dictator.
After buying his own DC-4 and rebuilding it, he hauled freight from South Florida airports to the south, and it was during this time that he met other pilots who flew clandestine loads with their lure of quick money in greater amounts than could be earned on the legal side of flying. That led Thurman to several crashes and one dramatic escape.