23/07/2025
No one saw him struggling. 💔
All they saw was a man acting out of control, chasing a moving plane.
For four hours, surveillance cameras captured Kyler Efinger running between gates, trying to break windows, forcing open doors. Airport staff reported “a white male harassing employees.” He was barefoot, frantic, completely lost.
Just days before, Kyler had the “best Christmas ever” with his family. He was rushing to see his dying grandfather. Knowing Kyler struggled with bipolar disorder, his father bought him a plane ticket instead of letting him drive nine hours alone.
But when airport delays caused him to miss his flight, everything unraveled. The stress triggered a manic episode.
After four hours of desperation, Kyler found an emergency exit and made it onto the runway.
Air traffic control warned pilots: “There’s a man running down the runway.” They found him unconscious, partially inside a plane engine. Kyler died that night.
His mother knew immediately: “They call it the manic phase.”
For hours, thousands of people saw him in obvious distress—dropping belongings, arguing, running barefoot through terminals.
But all they saw was someone “acting crazy.”
His father's words still echo: “If someone had just put their arm around him and said, ‘Hey, buddy, it looks like you're having a bad day. Can we help?’ I think it could have saved his life.”
Kyler wasn’t trying to terrorize an airport. He was a young man in crisis, believing that plane was his last chance to say goodbye to his grandfather.
The real tragedy isn’t just that he died. It’s that he died completely alone—in a place full of people. And no one stopped to ask if he was okay.
Behind every person “acting out of control” could be someone fighting an invisible battle. Someone who just needs one person to look past the chaos and ask:
"Are you alright?"
Sometimes, that question is the difference between someone’s worst day—and their last day.