Tag Archives: Luke Bucklin

Help move mountains

Here are two all-staff emails sent today by two of our three co-founders, Mike Derheim and Mike Schmidt:

Subject: Boots on the ground, grounded

I’ve been approached by some our Nerdery colleagues expressing interest in going to Wyoming to put more boots on the ground. Luke will be touched to hear this and he’ll back me up on saying that while this is sincerely appreciated, it’s not prudent. As qualified and tough as the search team is, there are even some of its members restricted from trekking into what we now understand to be among the most rugged and remote areas in the country. I feel as helpless as you do, but there is really nothing we can do, here or there, other than support each other and send our positive thoughts to Luke’s family and loved ones. If your faith guides you to http://prayersforluke.com, please know that your colleagues Tom O’Neill, Tad Runkel, and Gillian Reynolds worked quickly to make this site happen when called upon by the pastor at the Bucklin family’s church. These past days have been a test of anyone’s faith. Stay strong, stay here, and believe. My door is open.

- Mike Derheim

Subject: #LukeComeHome room

We’re all stressed from days of uncertainty, but I want to remind you all that best resource everyone at The Nerdery has is just that: everyone at The Nerdery. And while, like Mike D, my door is always open, our offices are only so big, so we’re setting up in Gameroom, now known as #LukeComeHome Command Center. This is a place you can come by and sit for a while to be among friends, or just catch your breath. Please pop your head in between meetings and check on the latest updates from the search. We’re filling the walls with emails, tweets, notes and other communications we’ve received wishing for Luke and the boys’ safe return. We’ve also got paper (green-bar, of course) and pens here so that if you want you can write a message of support for Luke’s family (we’ll deliver them to the house). We’re bringing in a counselor to facilitate a discussion for all who wish to talk – or just listen in – about coping with stress, sustaining morale, and supporting one other. We hope to have a counselor here at 5:00 today, and if not then, tomorrow at some time. Individual counseling will also be available to you, if you prefer. Meanwhile, please consider yourself welcome in the #LukeComeHome room. Seriously, come in here – I don’t want to be alone either.

- Mike Schmidt

Quick update: It’s just been confirmed that one and possibly two counselors will be here at 5 p.m. today. The confirmed counselor has already spent time with the Bucklin family today. All are welcome to stay.

Hopeful search continues

Below is the latest news from Wyoming. If you’re hopeful but feel helpless, let’s hope this helps: http://prayersforluke.com.

From: Fremont County Sheriff’s Office

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Contact: Sgt. Ryan Lee, 307-332-1021 (NOTE: NEW #)

UPDATE: Search for missing aircraft at 8:00 AM

(Lander, WY) – A four-member search team inserted into the rugged Fitzpatrick Wilderness Area of Northwest Wyoming’s Shoshone National Forest on Tuesday afternoon worked until after dark and began before first light Thursday. The team, and a second ground team that headed for the nine-square mile search area east of Gannett Peak early this morning, is searching for clues to the disappearance of a single-engine fixed-wind aircraft missing since Monday. Four members of a Minnesota family are believed to be on board.

“Our ground teams will be looking for clues and our air teams will be looking for the aircraft,” said Incident Commander Chip Williams at a 7:00 a.m. briefing. “This is a huge search area and we will be acting on intelligence as the days goes on. We’re going to hit this hard again today.”

Several helicopters crisscrossed the search area on multiple sorties Wednesday. A fast moving winter storm front that hit the area with up to 15 inches of snow Tuesday night made observation from the air difficult as search teams reported the ground cover was very bright with fresh white snow. The missing aircraft is also white. Search crews are concentrating their efforts east of the last known location of the aircraft where the terrain ranges from 11,000 to 13,000 feet in elevation.

Weather over the search area today includes increasing high cloudiness, windy conditions and slightly warmer temperatures predicted to reach into the low to mid 30s.

Scheduled to join the search effort this morning is a fixed-wing aircraft from the Park County, WY, Search and Rescue Team. The aircraft is equipped with highly sensitive detection equipment that may aid in locating any automated emergency transmissions from the missing aircraft, which have not been detected to this point.

Due to the remoteness of the search area, an Incident Command Center has been established at the Fremont County Sheriff’s Department in Lander and a heli-base is in operation at Lander’s Hunt Field General Aviation airport.

The remoteness of the site is providing a challenge for communications as search helicopters and ground crews working in the drainages east of Wyoming’s highest peak must relay information via satellite telephones or from aircraft flying above the ridgelines.

Fremont County, Wyoming is nearly 10,000 square miles in size, larger than seven other states. The Continental Divide is the western boundary of the county and the search area is located in a high mountainous region that separates Jackson Hole from the Wind River Basin. The nearest road from the search area is over 20 miles away with only hiking and horseback trails providing access into the area. The ground search teams were ferried into a location just outside of the wilderness boundary by helicopter.

Further information will be released as conditions warrant.

###

Hope for Luke

Dear friends,

Thanks for the all your hopeful words of support as we wait for further news on the search and rescue efforts for Luke and his sons. We’re grateful for the community support from all who are pulling for their safe return. Please join us in sending thoughts and best wishes to Nate, Nick and Noah’s mother Michelle. Here’s what we know:

Yesterday, the search and rescue team did an aerial search until weather conditions made it impossible for the two helicopters to continue.  A ground team was deployed as planned and spent daylight hours searching, but they could only get so close to the last known coordinates of Luke’s plane before setting up camp yesterday evening. The ground team resumed their search today at sunrise.

Weather is better today – clear, far less windy, with increased visibility – which should allow for a more comprehensive search effort. Since the weather has so far been the largest roadblock, this is very encouraging news. A larger aerial search is underway – now with three helicopters. Our contact in Wyoming described today as “beautiful.” We’re hopeful.

For the moment, that’s all the news we have. Thanks for keeping Luke’s family in your thoughts and prayers, and look for additional updates at Lukeandginger.com.

Update: press release from search team

Update: afternoon press release from search team

Update: “Thank you to everyone for their prayers and kind thoughts. We are reading all the emails and comments on websites and are tremendously grateful for the support of the entire community – local and national - at this difficult time.”  – Michelle, mom of Nick, Noah and Nate

Update: At approximately 5:25pm CST, Bucklin family friends Jennifer Kemp and Tracy Morgan read the following statement from the family of Luke, Nate, Noah and Nick Bucklin:

Need your prayers

A few moments ago our CFO Mike Derheim spoke to our entire staff and said as much of this as he could:

I have difficult news about Luke. It’s difficult because it’s about someone we know and love. It’s difficult because of what we know and what we don’t know.

We know that he left Wyoming flying his own plane yesterday, and that ground control lost contact with him at about 2 p.m. We know that search efforts have been hindered by bad weather, and that it has only recently cleared enough for planes and hikers to conduct a search.

Everyone here knows what Luke means to everyone here, as both a leader and a friend.

We will get through this by standing together, and by leaning on each other when we can’t. Pray for him, and for his family, and support each other.

We are telling you first, but we will also soon get word to others who can also send their thoughts and prayers. We can’t have too many people pulling for Luke and supporting his family and friends. If you feel you need to leave to deal with this privately, we understand and you can.

For those who don’t want to be alone this evening, stay. We’ll be organizing a gathering here for those who want to come together to extend thoughts and prayers to Luke and his family.

Luke’s wife Ginger will be posting information – as much as we know now – on Facebook and on their blog, Lukeandginger.com.

You all know Luke as perhaps the most approachable, affable executive the world has ever known. He’s been an open communicator in good times and bad times. I’m trying my best to follow his lead in that regard today.

If you have questions or want to talk, my door is open.

Luke is 40ish

On March 26, 2009, a more youthful Luke Bucklin was named to the 40 Under 40 list published by Minneapolis St. Paul Business Journal. And ever since that day, Luke has made darned sure everyone knew this to be true. While Biz Journal has kept its ear to the ground, Luke has gone out of his way to clumsily work his 40 Under 40 talking points into conversations with friends, colleagues, clients, family, passersby…

As Luke’s fortieth birthday approached, the publication sent word to him that he would have to renounce this particular feather-in-his cap upon reaching his fifth decade. Time has come today. This is probably why I heard him shout “This reeks of $#%^!&* ageism!” from his office the other day. Or perhaps it was the DMV calling to tell him he had to turn in his vanity plates.

Then came a letter from the FAA telling Luke to “please consider the world your no-fly zone until you retake your pilot’s license testing.”

Then came The Pentathanerd Committee’s “free advice memo” urging Luke to “please refocus your Pentathanerd gold medal aspirations toward The Senior Tour” (any sports fan can tell you Luke is the reigning Pentathanerd Boggle champ from the previous Summer Games).

But still, without coming right out and using the term “in decline,” some have seen this coming. The paparazzi recently shed harsh light on Luke’s mid-day naps in The Nerdery’s nooks and crannies.

Luke claims this photo was actually shot during the wee hours of the Overnight Website Challenge. We report; you decide.

In the recorded minutes of a recent executive team meeting, Luke wondered aloud, “As a Founding-Father of The Nerdery, shouldn’t my face be on currency?”

In a hastily commissioned poll, 73% of registered voters said this hairdo makes Luke appear “more presidential.” However, 88% of those under 40 said he looked like an old codger (completely unsolicited feedback; not even a survey question).

“I’ve found the secret to keeping my boyish looks forever: tanning!” he told his handlers. But it was too hot and he preferred the great indoors.

Pictured here fake-baked in arguably too much orange makeup (Luke will perhaps claim this facelift was not self-inflicted, and rather, it happened to him in while taping a Comcast Newsmakers segment for CNN’s Headline News).

It was a good run. Happy fortieth birthday, Luke. Consider the strong second act of Betty White – hotter than ever. There has to be a “50 Pushing 50″ list looking for a man of your good standing in the community. The campaign begins anew. Who’ll second my nomination?

Watch these kind words from a few well-wishers:

Luke@40 from The Nerdery on Vimeo.

Young Luke: back when The Nerdery was but a splinter in the mind's eye...