Dave Bohrer / The Meridian StarBoyd Williams poses Friday next to his airplane with his daughter Miranda Williams, who holds the iPhone 8 plus she dropped 1,000 feet from the plane Monday night, Sept. 24, 2018, in Meridian. The phone was found undamaged that night.

An apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, but when an Apple iPhone falls 1,000 feet from an airplane flying 100 mph, the odds of finding it undamaged and using it again are astronomical.

With some observation, calculation, determination, tools, teamwork and a full moon, however, you can make it happen.

On a clear Monday evening this week, Meridian realtor Boyd Williams, a pilot of 30 years, took his 24-year-old daughter, Miranda, flying in his 1946 North American Navion to enjoy the sights of Meridian at twilight under a full moon.

The plane is capable of flying with its canopy partially open, which allows for an unobstructed view for picture taking, an experience Miranda had never had during her many flights with her father.

They took off from Meridian Regional Airport into the twilight at 6:50 p.m. and Williams piloted the airplane up to 1,000 feet just east of Bonita Lakes so Miranda would have a good angle for her photos.

“That’s the most beautiful view of Meridian you will ever see,” Williams recalled saying.

Ten minutes into the flight, Miranda Williams cupped her month-old iPhone 8 plus, valued around $950, and stuck her hand a little too far outside the canopy.

Swoosh, and the 100 mph wind spirited it away.

“I think my heart stopped,” Miranda said. “I was in panic stage. When you drop a phone out an airplane window, you don’t think you’ll ever get it back. My mind was racing with the thought of having to buy a new one. I had just purchased this one.”

Her faith was challenged, but not her father’s.

“She didn’t think there was a snowball’s chance, but I was confident right away we would find it,” Boyd Williams said. “I didn’t think it would work, but I was confident by daylight we would find it.”

Williams noted their exact location, using the lake as a reference. Miranda previously had shared her iPhone location with him due to some recent travels, so he was able to use his phone’s location services to try to find hers. A dot appeared in a field near Willow Ridge Apartments.

Fifteen minutes after they took off, they landed at the airport and walked briskly to her car while telling a few people along the way what happened. Father and daughter drove to the field where they hoped to find her phone in the day’s last light.

They found instead chest-high weeds, saplings and prickly bushes. Thoughts of snakes and insects crept into their minds as Miranda walked through the growth wearing shorts. They called her phone several times but heard no ring.

After a half-hour search — and Miranda worn out mentally and physically and needing to get up for an early shift in her job as a nurse — the searchers called it quits and returned to the airport with a plan to resume the hunt at daybreak.

Hearing the story, however, three airport workers, including Miranda’s sister, Hannah Williams, Hannah’s friend Benjamin Eakes, and Federico Hourdebaigt, weren’t about to wait.

Hourdebaigt, in particular, was familiar with the area around the lost phone and was enticed by Miranda’s offer of a reward. He insisted they hunt for the phone as soon as their shift ended two hours later.

Armed with a metal director borrowed from Boyd Williams’ brother, the three airport workers and Boyd Williams returned to the field near Willow Ridge Apartments, which at 10 p.m. was cloaked in darkness.

The metal detector first found a few downed fence posts. Then, within 10 minutes, it pinged on something they couldn’t see buried in the thick ground cover. Boyd Williams swiped the area a couple of times with the metal detector and then a couple of times kicked the area with his foot. The phone lit up.

They paused to take photos and then Hannah called her sister’s number. The phone worked. Only a small corner of the screen had a crack, which Miranda later said came from a 3-foot drop to pavement one day as she was leaving work.

Hourdebaigt, with a small reward in his pocket, headed home, and the others drove to Miranda’s apartment to surprise her with the discovery.

She was stunned with disbelief.

“She said, ‘It’s impossible, you went out and bought a new one,” Boyd Williams recalled.

Miranda examined the phone to convince herself it was hers.

They paused in her kitchen for a prayer of thanks, and then there were phone calls to make and a story to tell.