Chapter 2

The next morning everybody got up at the crack of dawn to do their Bible study and pray for the trip ahead.

"Let us all memorize a verse to meditate on today," Rusty said to his family.

It was about noon by the time they were ready to go. Jim hugged Grandpa and Grandma good-bye. Tears welled up into his eyes as he walked up the steps of the plane. He was told it would be a long time before he could see them again.

Jim had a seat by the window. He was glad when the plane got over South America for he was tired of seeing just water and nothing else.

"That is the Amazon down there, Jim" he said, trying to cheer up his son, "It is over six million square miles of swamp."

"Wow! That makes the Okenofenokee Swamp about the size of a mud hole!" Jim exclaimed, staring out the window.

What seemed to be about an hour, the pilot said over the intercom, "Mr. & Mrs. Fargo, could you come up here a second?"

"Jim, stay seated and keep your seatbelt fastened," Rusty said as they went up to the cockpit closing the door behind them.

A few moments after they disappeared up front, Jim saw the engine on his side sputter and stop. Looking out the window across the plane, he saw the other engine had stopped, too. He noticed out the window that they were coming dangerously close to the trees. The next thing he saw was the wings as they clipped the treetops. They then hit an open spot and down onto the water! It seemed they skidded across the water for quite a long time. Suddenly, they hit something hard! The strain on Jim's seatbelt cut into his waist. It rendered him unable to move or hold up his head. Suddenly, everything went black!

When Jim came to, he looked out his window. He could see nothing but thick bushes wedged tightly up against the plane. He unbuckled his seatbelt and went to the door of the cockpit. He tried to open it. It would not budge! He noticed that the wall was bulging out toward him.

Fear struck him and he cried out, "Daddy, Mom, Dad, Mom! Can you hear me?" No one answered.

He turned to look around. Everything else seemed to be intact. All the lumbar and cargo had been tied down for the flight. He looked above him and noticed an emergency hatch midway of the cargo bay in the top of the plane. He saw a ladder with a latch that could be opened by pulling on a cord. He pulled the cord and a ladder dropped down. He climbed up and opened the hatch. Once out on top of the plane, he moved under the trees to the front. He knew from the way the bulkhead had bulged out there was not a lot of hope. Then he saw the front of the plane totally impacted into the bank of the river.

There was no way to get to the front of the plane. It was imbedded so deeply into the bank that there was no chance of survival for anyone in the cockpit, nor was there any way to get them out of the ground they were already in! It had given them an instant burial. The whole thing did not seem real. He wished this was a nightmare and he would wake up in the morning and everything would be okay. He tried to take everything in. He felt so sick that he thought he was going to throw up. He sat down on top of the plane and cried out once again, wishing he could hear his parents. But, he realized that he had lost both of his parents.

"What am I going to do? How am I going to survive?" Jim thought. He went back into the plane and closed the hatch. He went to the door of the cockpit and laid down for the night.

No one knew where they were. The pilot had made no contact since they left Miami. He had not filed a flight plan with the towers. No search party would be looking for the plane or Jim because no one knew where to look. Jim was lost in six million miles of the Amazon Rain Forest.

In the middle of the night, there suddenly came such a horrendous noise from outside! Some wild animals were really screaming, making the scariest sounds Jim had ever heard. He huddled in the darkness of the plane, shaking with fright, not knowing what dangerous animal was close by. Jim prayed that they would go away. He finally fell asleep from exhaustion.