On July 7th, 1979, Graham Barber, an experienced British Airways pilot, rented a single-engine Rallye 235 airplane in Anchorage. After a test flight, Barber, his friend, Mackintosh, and Mackintosh’s girlfriend, Susan Insole, flew toward Kodiak. The weather that evening was clear but very windy in Kodiak. Barber sent out a distress signal at approximately 5.45 pm while flying north-northeast of Kodiak Island. The air traffic controller at the Kodiak airport relayed the call to the U.S. Coast Guard, and searchers were in the air in ten minutes and over the last-known coordinates of Mackintosh’s plane in thirty minutes, but they saw no sign of the aircraft. The search continued for three days, but neither the plane nor its passengers were ever found.
If this had been any other plane with any other passengers, the incident would have been noted as tragic but, unfortunately, far too common. Controversy swirled around the disappearance of Ian Mackintosh, though. Was he a double agent for the Russians during the Cold War, and did he set up his disappearance to defect to the Soviet Union? Or, was he exposed as a British spy and now going into hiding from either the KGB or a terrorist organization such as Black September?
Ian’s brother, Lawrie, gave a frank interview about his brother, categorizing Ian as sometimes ruthless but never disloyal to Great Britain. However, Lawrie thought it was possible Ian went underground and said the last time he spoke to Ian, he got the impression Ian was telling him goodbye. After Ian’s disappearance, Lawrie said Ian’s ex-father-in-law, an admiral in the Royal Navy, was blocked when he tried to learn more about Ian’s disappearance. He was told not to ask questions.
The type of aircraft Barber chose to rent for the trip to Kodiak adds even more intrigue to this mystery. A Rallye 235 does not have doors but instead employs a canopy. If the plane landed right-side-up on the water, its occupants could slide back the top and exit the aircraft. This model of aircraft is sometimes referred to as a “Tin Parachute” because it is capable of slow, controlled flight, even without power. According to the Anchorage pilot who checked out Graham Barber in the Rallye, Barber requested to practice power-off stalls during his familiarization with the plane. Ian’s brother, Lawrie, found the choice of airplane curious because he remembers his brother telling him the flying conditions in Alaska could be so dangerous, he would never fly there in anything other than a twin-engine plane.
Did Graham Barber land the Rallye on the ocean, and did he, Susan Insole, and Ian Mackintosh go into hiding? If they did, the U.S. Coast Guard must have been involved in the plot because it is unlikely three individuals could have boarded another plane or boat and disappeared in the short time it took for the Coast Guard to arrive on site. Conflicting information exists about sea conditions the day the plane disappeared. One report lists 40-ft (12.2-m) seas in the area, making it impossible for a plane to land on the ocean. On the other hand, the air traffic controller at the Kodiak airport said it would have been possible to land safely on the ocean on the evening of July 7th, 1979.
We may never know what happened to Ian Mackintosh, Graham Barber, and Susan Insole, but no piece of their airplane has ever been found.
