Aero Commander N3815C

     The date was October 4, 1979. John St. John left West Palm Beach about 10 o’clock in the morning in his Aero Commander 500. His destination was Andros
Town, Andros Island and then Great Harbor Cay, both in the Bahamas.

     The flight went well and he made both destinations on schedule.

       At 3:30 p.m. St. John left Andros Town for his return to West Palm Beach. Per
           usual with flights, he headed toward Bimini Island to home in on its
               beacon, then cut across to Florida.

                       The weather was cloudy, with broken thunderstorms. The
                       conditions were not severe and are typical of the tropics.
                       St. John was used to it and could easily avoid any areas of
                     weather build up. (The actual on-sight weather comes from
                       several pilots flying the route. They reported to tower
                     controllers that the conditions were VFR— i.e. sufficiently
                     broken to fly visually and not on instruments. They also
                     reported that they could easily avoid any downpours).

                     In spite of the benign weather, St. John vanished.

               Private vessels immediately began to search (the Gulf Stream is often
           chocked with boats) and were soon joined by Coast Guard cutter Cape Current
         and then US Navy and Bahamanian rescue units. All were keeping an eye out
         for a 6 man orange life raft St. John carried on board, plus any sign of debris.
       Miami SAR kept a constant vigil on the incoming data. On October 12, it seemed
       hopeless. Miami sent the following radiogram to Cape Current at 8:21 a.m.

   N3815C OVERDUE. 1. SITUATION A. SUBJ REMAINS UNLOCATED. 2. ACTIVE SEARCH SUSPENDED PENDING FURTHER DEVELOPMENTS.

   There never were any further developments. St. John and his Aero Commander 500 completely disappeared on a route with which he was very familiar.