The plane of John William “Bill” Kissinger went missing in the Gulf of Mexico, and the rescue mission is still taking place. Bill had a small aircraft which departed on Wednesday and expected to arrive at Georgetown, Texas at 6:12 in the afternoon.
The Coast Guard started searching for the last contact point, and the North American Aerospace Defense Command sent four F-16 to help with the search. According to a KFOR-TV statement, “He was piloting his plane yesterday evening in route to Texas to pick-up some rescue dogs in need of help when his plane mysteriously veered off course.”
The Georgetown Municipal Airport manager told KVUE they never had contact with Kissinger. They usually only have a connection when pilots are ready to arrive.
The U.S. Coast Guard, the US State Department, and Mexican authorities are in charge of the investigation. Bill was planning to land in Texas to get a husky dog to Oklahoma City to get transferred to Las Vegas for rehabilitation.
Friends transported the dog to Oklahoma City on Thursday in Bill’s honor. “I kind of felt like we had already committed to it, we needed to do it, especially under the circumstances, in Bill’s honor and memory. We don’t know what happened, but we wanted to do this to kind of remember him and get the dog to a safe place,” said Blackburn, one of Bill’s friends.
According to Blackburn, Bill was charismatic and they met up a few times to transfer dogs in the program. Many of his friends and colleagues wanted to honor him for his excellent work with dogs. One of them even called him, “larger than life.”
This article was inspired by KVUE // Pilot at center of Gulf of Mexico search was headed to Texas to pick up dog: Rescue group