Aircraft went down in 1998, found by a bear hunter this week

The search for a pilot missing for six years after he crashed in the mountains of North Carolina is finally over, and Walter Parker's family has finally found the closure they sought for so many years.

The single engine aircraft left Portsmouth (OH) almost exactly four years ago, on November 4, 1998, on a trip to Andrews-Murphy Airport, to visit his son on his birthday. Parker was 72 at the time. The aircraft never arrived at its destination, and the CAP began the search along with several law enforcement agencies. It was never found, but Parker's son, an FBI agent, never gave up trying to find his dad, taking vacations in the area to continue the search.

This week, a bear hunter found the wreck and the remains of Mr. Parker in the Joyce Kilmer Slickrock Wilderness area of the Nantahala National Forest, according to Rick Schwein, the supervisor of the Asheville FBI office. "This family has literally come and walked these mountains and searched for him for the past six years. They never gave up on it," said Schwein. "We can finally give closure to this family."

Schwein added that finding the wreck of the aircraft in a national forest is not unusual, and pointed out that they found one when they were looking for wll-known fugitive Eric Rudolph in 2003.

(Senior Contributing Editor Kevin O'Brien did some research on this story after we pulished it on 10/30/04 and found the link to the NTSB report (below), which reveals additional information, such as the fact that the aircraft was a Piper PA-28-180 Cherokee.)

FMI: www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/brief.asp?ev_id=20001211X11487&key=1