Dad Pays $800 For Helicopter To Find Missing Son After Feeling Situation Was ‘Seriously Wrong’

Jun 02, 2022 by apost team

In 2018, Australian teen Samuel Lethbridge didn't return home one night. His family feared that the then 17-year-old had been in a car accident. So his dad commissioned a helicopter to search for him and found him after 30 hours.

We commonly hear about the uncanny parental instincts moms have for their children, but it turns out dads also have this instinct — as is the case with Tony Lethbridge.

Tony is an Australian father whose son, Samuel, had gone missing on Jan. 14, 2018. On that day Samuel went to go visit his girlfriend in a nearby town according to Huffington Post.

Twenty-four hours passed and nobody had heard from him, and this sent the Lethbridge family into a panic. Tony and wife Lee reported his disappearance to the police where they were told to just go home and wait for him to return — much to their disbelief.

Tony told the Sydney Morning Herald that the police suggested that he might've run off, which wasn't in Samuel's character. Tony became frustrated and decided not to wait. 

The Lethbridge family had doubts that their son had really run away, so they began searching for other possibilities and options. They wanted to make sure that they did everything they possibly could to help find their son as soon as possible. 

Tony had a gut instinct that something just wasn’t adding up, so he took measures into his own hands and hired a helicopter for $800 to continue desperately searching for his missing son. Read on to find out more about this incredible story of a father’s intuition.

According to Inside Edition, Tony said: “When I saw the police, they thought he’d run away. I said, ‘That’s not Samuel.’ When he doesn’t show up or phone, something’s seriously wrong.”

Tony said he had a feeling that Samuel had crashed his car as he was traveling in an area where another driver had crashed. The driver wasn't found for five days due to the thickness of the brush in the area, and they ultimately died from dehydration.

Tony realized that if this were the case, then Samuel would only be found by air. He contacted Skyline Aviation Group and hired a chopper to search for his son. As Tony had trouble flying, his brother Michael went with the pilot instead.

Within 10 minutes the Lethbridge family heard that Samuel's car was found. It was pieced together that Samuel had crashed his car, and that Samuel had been lying there for nearly 30 hours.

The dehydrated and injured Samuel was pulled from the wreckage by emergency services and taken to intensive care. Despite the seriousness of his condition, Samuel survived the ordeal, and as of The Daily Mail's late-January coverage in 2018, Samuel was walking and talking again.

On Facebook Samuel's sister, Megan revealed that Skyline Aviation Group had refunded the cost of the chopper ($1,000 AUD, or roughly $800 USD) to the family. The family also set up an online fundraiser dedicated to helping Samuel recover.

Tony is being praised as a hero for his actions in helping find his missing son, and it goes to show that both parents have equally strong protective instincts for their children.

apost.com

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