Merrill Field

44-year-old Donald Clyde Johnston, his wife, 41-year-old Karen Johnston, along with 44-year-old Monty Owen Parrish and his wife, 41-year-old Linda May Parrish, were all last seen together on June 29, 1977, in Anchorage, Alaska.

On that day, the group had crowded into a yellow-and-white Cessna 182 airplane, owner unknown, and had left Merrill Field.

There's little information available about the disappearance of these four, and the only information I was able to find comes from the Charlie Project and NamUs.

According to the Charlie Project, the group hadn't made a flight plan, but it's presumed they were headed over the Denali National Park to take in its stunning beauty.

You can imagine Elmendorf there in Alaska.

Well, Lake Hood and Anchorage International at Merrill Field's departure cross under and over our arrival pattern.

So the Secret Service guy standing right next to me, and per regulation, I'm supposed to clear him to land no later than three miles.

Well, it's four miles, it's five miles.

The National Transportation Safety Board has released its preliminary report on last month's plane crash in Seldovia that killed all four people on board.

Investigators say the Piper PA-24 took off from Merrill Field in Anchorage on August 26th on a day flight to Seldovia.

The privately operated plane crashed while trying to land that afternoon.

NTSB aviation accident investigator Millicent Hill says investigators have not determined a cause for the crash.

It occurred in Seldovia, Alaska, on August 26 and killed all four people aboard.

The pilot and three passengers departed from Merrill Field in Anchorage for a day flight to Seldovia.

The FAA's chart supplement for the airport notes that the surface of the Seldovia Airport is gravel, and the length is 1,845 feet.

The slope to clear obstacles for Runway 16 is an 11-to-1 slope.

You're like, "Wow, that was a one, one, one of one." So we do this whole tour and see all this, watch the seaplanes take off and land all day, you know, just...

A- and then there's a whole nother airport d- in downtown called Merrill Field, which is just like right in the middle of Anchorage.

So we drove down there, and there's a million other bush planes there.

[laughs] So it's just amazing to see all these different airplanes.

Dillon hit Anchorage, cargo heavies and rows.

Lake Hood float planes putting on a show.

Bush type Skymaster, Merrill Field tour.

F Street sticker wall, had to add one more.

people.

So he spent much of his free time hunting, and in January of 1982, he officially bought a blue and white Piper Super Club bush plane that he kept at Merrill Field Airport in Anchorage.

And this allowed him the freedom to go way deeper into the wilderness, into places where cars would otherwise not be able to go.

So an actual plane.

She was never going to come back.

Good job, Cindy.

So still handcuffed, he drives her over to Merrill Field Airport and he is loading supplies into his small airplane.

Seeing that he was distracted, she took a moment of opportunity to flee his car, desperately running down a gravel road, naked, barefoot and still handcuffed.