John Testrake
John Leight Testrake (born December 2, 1927 in Ripley , New York , † February 6, 1996 in St. Joseph , Missouri ) was an American pilot with the airline TWA . He became famous worldwide for the hijacking of Flight 847 in 1985.
origin
Testrake comes from a family with Dutch roots: his grandfather John William Te Strake was born in 1867 in Winterswijk (province of Gelderland ). As a nine-year-old orphan, John William emigrated to the USA. In 1897 he married Della Pratt, who came from a strictly Methodist family, and adopted the Methodist faith himself, which shaped the family's religious orientation for generations. With the wedding, John William also changed the spelling of the family name to Testrake .
Childhood and youth
John Leight Testrake was born the first of five children to Frank John Testrake and Mildred (née Koefod). Due to the Great Depression , his childhood was marked by a lack of money and hard work on his parents' farm. As a result, it was a particularly great reward for him when, at the age of twelve, his father gave him a sightseeing flight. This flight sparked Testrake's interest and passion for aviation.
Professional and family development
After graduating from high school in June 1945, Testrake signed up for pilot training with the US Air Force , but was turned down because of a visual defect. After a short and very boring time in a civilian company, he joined the US Navy . At first he was used for office work in the Ministry of Defense , after a request in which he asked that "the main thing to do with airplanes" he was transferred to an aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean .
After serving in the Navy, Testrake began studying aircraft and engine engineering at the Spartan School of Aeronautics in Tulsa , Oklahoma . There he met Patricia Humprey, whom he married in 1951. After training as an airplane mechanic occupied Testrake in Tulsa the newly introduced training course of the flight engineer . After completing his studies, he first worked as an aircraft mechanic. He bought a Fairchild PT-19 from a colleague who was drafted into the Korean War for $ 50 , on which he then learned to fly.
In the spring of 1951, Testrake received an offer from American Airlines as a flight engineer on a DC-6 . However, the start of work was thwarted by his conscription to the Korean War. Testrake was used in homeland security and served as a flight engineer on patrol flights in Washington State until 1953 . After the Korean War, Testrake got a job at TWA as a flight engineer on the Lockheed Constellation in 1953 and, in the following years, continued training as a copilot and ultimately as a flight captain. Testrake was mainly used on domestic flights.
His wife Patricia died of cancer in 1976; In 1977 he married his second wife Phyllis Hiser. In 1985 Testrake signed up for international flights and was deployed from April onwards, initially from Rome and later from Athens on routes in the Mediterranean.
TWA flight 847
On June 14, 1985 Testrake was only supposed to make a short flight from Athens to Rome, after which he wanted to take a cruise with his wife, who was staying in Athens, for their wedding anniversary. However, shortly after taking off from Athens, the plane was taken over by air pirates and hijacked to Beirut . In an odyssey lasting several days, the plane shuttled back and forth between Beirut and Algiers several times. Several times, the airports wanted to refuse the hijacked machine to land, and in Beirut the runway was even blocked with obstacles. However, Testrake enforced the landing permit every time by pointing out the fuel supply and the threatened or actual use of force by the hijackers against passengers.
After a total of five flights between Beirut and Algiers, Testrake did not want to risk any further flights due to long overdue maintenance. The kidnappers also toyed with the idea of flying on to Tehran or crashing the plane in Jerusalem on the Knesset . Testrake wanted to prevent both; Therefore, on June 16, when landing in Beirut, he faked two of the three engines to fail, which the hijackers could not see through. From then on, the aircraft remained on the ground in Beirut.
Due to his level-headed and calm demeanor during the 17-day kidnapping, Testrake was often referred to as the "island of calm".
After the abduction was over, Testrake and the other hostages returned to the US via Damascus and Frankfurt and were received by President Ronald Reagan on July 2, 1985 at Andrews Air Force Base . Testrake received a heroic welcome in his hometown of Richmond that same day and a few days later in his hometown of Ripley.
In September 1988 Testrake traveled to Frankfurt to testify as a witness in the trial of Mohammed Ali Hamadi , who was accused of involvement in the kidnapping of TWA 847 and the murder of Robert Stethem .
Further life
Testrake flew another two years for TWA and retired in 1987 after 34 years of service. In his retirement he was heavily involved in his Methodist Church in Richmond, went on many lecture tours and flew supply flights for Mission Aviation Fellowship and the like. a. in Haiti , Zaire , Indonesia , New Guinea and Angola .
Testrake was also politically active. So he obtained z. B. 1992 the nomination of the Republican Party for the election to the House of Representatives from Missouri , but was defeated in the main ballot to the Democratic competitor.
1994 at Testrake cancer diagnosed that is already in the whole body metastases had formed. He died of this cancer on February 6, 1996 and was buried in Richmond Memory Gardens in Richmond, Missouri. In addition to his second wife Phyllis, he also left three biological children (John, Deborah and Dianne), three stepchildren (Russell, Jeffrey and Cindy) and a total of 13 grandchildren.
John Testrake received numerous obituaries in the international press as well as in aviation associations and many Christian churches worldwide.
Book and film
John Testrake's story was published in the book Triumph over Terror on Flight 847 , which he co-wrote with David J. Wimbish, ISBN 978-0800715274 (German Terror in the Cockpit , ISBN 978-3775113885 ).
The abduction of Flight 847 was filmed in 1988 as The Taking Of Flight 847 (other original title: The Uli Derickson Story ), with Sandy McPeak as John Testrake. The German first broadcast was as 847 - Flug des Schreckens on November 4, 1991 on Pro7 .
Another film adaptation exists as a 30-minute documentary aircraft hijacking TWA flight 847 .
Web links
- Literature by and about John Testrake in the catalog of the German National Library
- Wolfgang Polzer: Relaxed - despite a gun in the neck ; from: ideaSpectrum, edition of February 14, 1996
Individual evidence
- ↑ Topics / Subjects / H / Hijacking obituary in the New York Times, February 7, 1996
- ↑ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096216/
- ↑ 847 - Flight of Terror in the online film database
- ↑ http://www.amazon.de/Flugzeugentführung-TWA-Flug-847-VHS/dp/B00004RPX3
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Testrake, John |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Testrake, John Leight |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American pilot |
| DATE OF BIRTH | December 2, 1927 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Ripley , New York |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 6, 1996 |
| Place of death | St. Joseph , Missouri |