Disaster at Lockerbie

Returning home from our day trip to Edinburgh, myself and Mrs AWS have pause for thought as we eat our Burger Kings in Standard Premium and watch the Scottish Lowlands flash past from the train window. By an astonishing and tragic coincidence, the sites of Britain’s worst train and air disasters both lie in Dumfriesghire and sit only 15 miles apart. Last time, we said a prayer while passing through Quintinshill Loops near Gretna. This week we reflect while thundering through Lockerbie station.

Pan Am Flight 103

The Lockerbie disaster, also known as the Lockerbie bombing, occurred on December 21, 1988. Pan Am Flight 103, a Boeing 747-121 named Clipper Maid of the Seas, was en route from Frankfurt to Detroit via London and New York when it was destroyed by a bomb over Lockerbie in the Scottish borders. All 259 passengers and crew aboard the aircraft, along with 11 residents on the ground, were killed in the explosion, making it Britain’s deadliest terrorist attack.

Thirty-eight minutes into the flight, at 7:03 PM, the bomb detonated in the forward cargo hold of the aircraft at an altitude of 31,000 feet. Running late, had the plane been on time the bomb would have exploded over the open ocean, making any investigation into the cause of the crash more difficult.

Talk of which is a reminder that although the Lockerbie bombing is the biggest terrorist outrage visited upon our country, it is not the most serious in the British Isles.

Air India Flight 182

Three years previously, on June 23, 1985, a Boeing 747-237B named Emperor Kanishka was scheduled as Air India Flight 182 from Montreal to London, from where it would continue to Delhi and Bombay.

On the same day, a Mr L Singh checked luggage onto Canadian Pacific Flight 003 in Vancouver but did not join the flight. While transiting Tokyo’s Narita airport, a bomb concealed in the Singh luggage exploded prematurely, killing two baggage handlers. The luggage was to be loaded onto the intended target, Air India Flight 301 to Delhi.

One hour later, as Air India Flight 182 cruised at 31,000 feet over the Atlantic Ocean off the southwest tip of the coast of Ireland, a second bomb hidden in a suitcase in 182’s forward cargo hold exploded, killing all 329 passengers and crew on board.

A coordinated effort to attack both flights simultaneously failed due to a miscalculation of the time difference regarding Japanese daylight saving time.

The bombs were the responsibility of Canada-based Sikh extremists seeking revenge against the Indian government for the previous year’s Operation Blue Star, in which the Indian military stormed the Golden Temple in Amritsar and in doing so pushed sectarian hatreds in the subcontinent beyond boiling point. The militant group Babbar Khalsa, led by Talwinder Singh Parmar, were identified as the masterminds behind the attack.

The investigation that followed involved authorities from Canada, India, Ireland, and the United States. Wreckage, scattered over a wide area of the Atlantic, was painstakingly recovered and examined. Forensic experts confirmed that a bomb using a sophisticated timing device caused the explosion. The explosive used was a powerful RDX-based substance concealed within a cassette player.

Suspect Parmar was killed in a police encounter in India in 1992. Another key suspect, Inderjit Singh Reyat, was eventually convicted of manslaughter for his role in assembling the bombs. Reyat, a mechanic resident in westernmost Canada, had purchased explosives, batteries and detonators used to construct the bombs.

His apparent cooperation with prosecutors led to the indictment of Ripudaman Singh Malik and Ajaib Singh Bagri in 2000. However, in an unsatisfactory conclusion, five years later both were acquitted due to insufficient evidence and perjury on the part of Reyat. Many questions remain unanswered.

After two decades behind bars, Inderjit Singh Reyat was freed and allowed, according to the Canadian parole authorities, to ‘return to a normal life.’

The Pam Am 103 investigation

The explosion on Pan Am Flight 103 caused the aircraft to disintegrate almost instantly, scattering debris over a wide area. Lockerbie bore the brunt of the destruction, with large sections of the plane crashing onto the town’s Sherwood Crescent, half a mile from the railway station and about a quarter of a mile from the West Coast mainline. A wing section containing 30,000 gallons of fuel devastated a row of houses and killed 11 residents.

At 07:30 pm a TV newsflash interrupted the adverts at the end of This is Your Life to report the news to a stunned nation. The following days were busy on the other side of the border at the nearest airfield, Carlisle Crosby. Movements included a Boeing 727 bringing relatives and officials from America.

The following year, Mr Thomas G Plaskette, chairman of the board of Pan Am Corporation, wrote to the airport manager expressing ‘The corporation’s sincere appreciation and gratitude for the support and assistance you offered so unselfishly throughout the period after the bombing of our Flight 103.’ Mr Plaskette noted the efforts of individuals and volunteer organisations, ‘Many of whom were strangers to one another and who came together in a strong bond to work as a team.’

Closer to the site of the disaster, search parties fanned out and painstakingly combed through debris spread over more than 845 square miles, gathering fragments of the aircraft, body parts, personal belongings and forensic evidence. The search also had to include residents’ property in case important evidence might be being kept as souvenirs.

Immediately following the disaster, the UK’s Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) took charge of the inquiry, with assistance from other international agencies.

A large shed was cleared at a munitions depot near Longtown, just north of Carlisle and also on the West Coast mainline, to collect and partially re-assemble the wreckage. An idea of scale can be understood from the bicycle propped against a stanchion in the top left of picture 2.

Parts of the plane having been reconstructed, investigators could determine the exact location of the bomb and the manner in which it had been detonated. Evidence was sent to the Royal Armament Research and Development Establishment (RARDE) at Fort Halstead, near Sevenoaks. A team led by Dr Tom Hayes discovered fragments of a Semtex bomb, which brought to mind an earlier attempted outrage and pointed the finger of suspicion towards Syria.

To be continued…
 

© Always Worth Saying 2024