Trans-World Airlines Flight 847

TWA flight 847 was an international flight on a Boeing 727 operated by Trans World Airlines that was hijacked on June 14, 1985 by the terrorist organization for the oppressed , a group with ties to Hezbollah , on its flight from Athens to Rome . A three-day odyssey through the Mediterranean region began for the crew and passengers , during which an American passenger was murdered. A few dozen passengers were then held by the terrorist organization for two weeks until they were released.

Aircraft hijacking

With 153 passengers on board started captain John Testrake on 14 June 1985 at 10:10 hours local time one of TWA in 1974 directly from Boeing acquired Boeing 727-200 with the air vehicle registration number N64339 and serial number 20844 from the airport of the Greek capital towards Rome. The crew included copilot Philip G. Maresca, flight engineer Benjamin C. Zimmerman and flight attendant Uli Derickson .

Shortly after the start, two Lebanese called for a change of course. The two men had smuggled pistols and grenades past security. A third accomplice by the name of Ali Atwa had previously been removed from the passenger list and was later arrested in Greece.

To Beirut, then to Algiers

The plane was diverted from Greek airspace to the Middle East and made its first stop in Beirut , Lebanon , where 19 passengers - 17 elderly women and two children - were released in exchange for refueling the plane. At the time, Lebanon was in the middle of a civil war and Beirut was divided into sectors controlled by various militias .

In the afternoon, the plane took off for Algiers , Algeria in North Africa , where another 20 passengers were released during a five-hour layover before the plane returned to Beirut on Saturday night.

Back in Beirut

During this stay, the hijackers identified a US Navy diver, Robert Stethem , among the passengers. They beat him, shot him and threw his body off the plane onto the runway. Several passengers with Jewish-sounding names were taken off the plane but not released.

Again Algiers, again Beirut

The international airport of Beirut is Shiite surrounding neighborhoods, but has no security fence and the residents were able to get easily to the airfield. Almost a dozen armed men escorted the air pirates before the plane returned to Algiers on Saturday June 15, 1985, where another 65 passengers and flight attendant Derickson were released. On Sunday, June 16, the plane returned to Beirut, where it landed and stayed in the afternoon.

The kidnappers' initial demands were:

• the release of all Shiites held by Israel in Lebanon ,
• international condemnation of Israeli military actions in southern Lebanon ,
• condemning the actions of the United States in the Middle East and
• the conviction of the Beirut car bomb attack on March 8, 1985 . (Rumor has it that the attack that killed 80 people was carried out at the instigation of the Central Intelligence Agency .)

The Greek government released Ali Atwa from custody and in return the kidnappers released eight Greek citizens, including the Greek singer Demis Roussos .

On the morning of June 17, 1985, the rest of the hostages on board were moved to a location outside the aircraft to avoid being released by commando units. These hostages were placed under the power of Nabih Berri , the Shiite leader of the Amal militia . Berri was a member of the fragmented Lebanese government. One of the hostages was released when heart problems arose. The remaining 39 hostages - d. H. including the hostages with Jewish-sounding names held in Beirut after the second landing - remained prisoner until June 30th. That day they were brought to Syria and then flown to Germany on board a US Air Force plane .

Within a month of the kidnapping, Israel released 31 of the Shiite detainees named by the kidnappers. Israel, however, denied any connection, saying that the layoffs had been planned for a long time.

Praise and appreciation for flight attendant Uli Derickson

The German-American flight attendant Uli Derickson , who was praised by the press and the public for her level-headed behavior , exercised a calming influence on the kidnappers as intermediary translator during the kidnapping, thereby saving the lives of many passengers. After landing in Beirut for the first time, she succeeded in persuading the kidnappers to release the 17 older women and two children. Since the kidnappers hardly spoke English, but one of them spoke German , their German was the only way of communicating with the kidnappers in a sufficiently understandable manner. In particular, when the ground crew responsible for the supply of fuel at Algiers airport refused to refuel the aircraft without payment after the second landing there, they eased the critical situation by using their own credit card to pay for several thousand gallons of aviation fuel for a total of USD 11,000 provided.

In 1985 she received the Cross of Merit on Ribbon of the Federal Republic of Germany and the "Silver Cross for Heroism" as the first female recipient of this award, which has been awarded since 1957 by the American veterans' association Legion of Valor

consequences

On October 10, 2001, the three accused hijackers Imad Mughnija , Ali Atwa and Hassan Izz-Al-Din were added to the FBI Most Wanted Terrorists list as a result of September 11, 2001, along with 19 other fugitive terrorists . The United States continues to offer a $ 5 million reward for fixing it . Mughniya was killed in a car bomb attack in February 2008.

Another kidnapper, Mohammed Ali Hammadi, was arrested in Frankfurt am Main in 1987 when he tried to smuggle liquid explosives two years after the hijacking of TWA Flight 847. He was also charged with the murder of TWA passenger Robert Stethem and sentenced to life in prison. After serving almost 19 years in prison, he was released by the German authorities in December 2005 on the basis of assessments that he was no longer dangerous, subject to the condition that he must travel to Lebanon immediately, which he complied with. The federal government rejected speculation that this was done as part of a deal that led to the release of the German hostage Susanne Osthoff in Iraq . Already in 2004 reports in Israel of the impending release of Hamadi in exchange for information about the fate of the kidnapped Israeli soldier Ron Arad . The United States then tried the Lebanese authorities to extradite Mohammed Ali Hammadi for the murder of Robert Stethem during the hijacking of the plane. On February 24, 2006, Mohammed Ali Hammadi remained on the FBI's list of most wanted terrorists under the name Mohammed Ali Hamadei .

34 years after the spectacular aircraft hijacking, the Greek police said they had arrested one of the alleged perpetrators on September 19, 2019. The Greek authorities announced today that there were two European arrest warrants applied for by Germany for the 65-year-old. The arrest took place on the island of Mykonos. According to media reports, the man has already been transferred to the central Greek prison Korydallos near Athens. Two days later it turned out that the investigators targeted the person because they had the same name. It was a Lebanese journalist who was released.

The FBI published the names of all four accused kidnappers on its wanted posters as leading members of a group called "Lebanese Hezbollah" according to the FBI, which is classified as a terrorist organization. The Hezbollah denied - as with a number of other attacks attributed to the movement - a participation in the kidnapping.

The hijacked Boeing 727-200 initially remained with TWA until November 2000 (last flight on September 30th from New Orleans to St. Louis ) and was acquired in May 2002 by Aeroturbine , an American company specializing in the resale of aircraft parts. cannibalized in Victorville , California.

Movie

• The film Delta Force (1986) was inspired by the events.
• The television movie The Taking of Flight 847: The Uli Derickson Story (1988) was based directly on the kidnapping.

Web links

• Associated Press : 1985 TWA And Hamadi Chronology, History of the Abduction, July 3, 1988

Individual evidence

1. ↑ TWA Purser Paid Fuel Tab For Hijacked Flight With Credit Card, Associated Press report , July 15, 1985, accessed August 3, 2014
2. ↑ Hero Of Twa Hijacking Wins Medal: Derickson Forgives Those Who Said She Aided Terrorists, in: Orlando Sentinel, October 5, 1985, accessed on August 3, 2014
3. ↑ History ( Memento of the original from October 11, 2002) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  on the website of the Legion of Valor, accessed on August 3, 2014 (English)
4. ^ Matthias Gebauer: Hamadi Release: Head Shaking in Washington, in: Spiegel Online from December 21, 2005, accessed on January 8, 2015
5. ^ "Germany paroles terrorist after 19-year term," MSNBC.MSN.com, accessed September 2, 2006
6. ↑ Aluf Benn: Germany's 'bargaining chips' for Arad - Hezbollah operatives and Iranian agents, in: Haaretz from January 27, 2004, accessed on August 3, 2014 (English)
7. ↑ BBC News : "US 'seeks justice' for hijacker" , accessed September 2, 2006
8. ↑ FBI : FBI Updates Most Wanted Terrorists and Seeking Information - War on Terrorism Lists ( March 1, 2006 memento on the Internet Archive ), FBI press release February 24, 2006, accessed September 2, 2006
9. ↑ kidnappers arrested? : TWA flight 847 back in the headlines orf.at, September 21, 2019, accessed September 22, 2019.
10. ↑ Greece: Police release alleged hijacker - he was just a vacationer! Retrieved September 24, 2019 . 
11. ↑ http://www.diecastaircraftforum.com/archive/t-12350.html
12. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from May 18, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.