Pan Am 103

Pan Am 103

On 21 Dec 1988, Pan Am Flight 103, en road from London to New York, exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland only one-half an sixty minutes after departure, killing 259 passengers too crew too nine people on the ground. Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 bomb was suspected, too authorities recovered the “black box” (the flying phonation recorder too information recorder) too examined radar evidence.

Britain’s Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) too Scottish detectives collected 35,000 photographs too interviewed 15,000 people, but it was the regain of an electronic timer circuit board, which had been placed inwards a Toshiba cassette actor too and then loaded into a slice of Samsonite luggage, that provided the necessary clues every bit to the source of the plane’s destruction.

The subsequent investigation, every bit with the after crash of TWA Flight 800, produced endless analysis, suspicion, claims, too counterclaims. Victims’ families wanted someone to blame; politicians wanted to flora whether the lawsuit was an attack; too conspiracy theorists tried to insert the lawsuit into existing theories of global politics.


Although the explosion occurred patch George Bush was president, links were speedily made to President Ronald Reagan, too then, during the investigation too trial, to President Bill Clinton. Ultimately, a vast array of individuals too organizations were implicated inwards about means or about other to the explosion.

The AAIB, led yesteryear forensic proficient James Thomas Thurman, found the small-scale circuit board inwards the debris, too could line the bit of the circuit board to a Swiss manufacturer. This, inwards association with specimens from ii types of chemicals used to industry Semtex, a plastic explosive, convinced authorities at that spot was a bomb aboard the plane that was triggered yesteryear a timing device.

In 1989, the 350 tons of debris was reassembled at an regular army base of operations close Carlisle. Investigators too then examined the evidence too concluded that it was a bomb, or, inwards their words, an “intentional explosive device.” The cockpit phonation recorder verified a tremendous audio only prior to the aircraft going down, too strength out marks on luggage indicated that something exploded inwards the luggage compartment.

Although at commencement Islamic Republic of Iran was suspected of what the authorities viewed every bit a bombing—although the give-and-take “bomb” did non look inwards the actual report, but rather “improvised explosive device”—the timer shifted the investigation to ii Libyan tidings agents, Abdel Basset al-Megrahi too Lameen “The Egg” Fhima, who were indicted inwards 1991 too named yesteryear both British too U.S. governments every bit the culprits.

There were, however, numerous other theories too suspects:

• Ahmed Jibril, caput of the General Command of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP-GC). Supported yesteryear Syria, the PFLP hated State of Israel too wanted to punish the US for its back upwardly of the Jewish State. Conspiracy theorists claim that Jibril, however, could non live brought to judge because Palestine is non a sovereign state or a fellow member of the United Nations. This conspiracy theory is also tied to Iran, which supposedly bankrolled the operation, but Syrian Arab Republic could non live implicated because, yesteryear the fourth dimension the US learned all the details, it was involved inwards the Gulf War too President George Bush needed Syrian Arab Republic every bit piece of employment of the coalition to defeat Saddam Hussein.
• Iran. One of the around widely held conspiracy theories is that Iranian agents blew Pan Am 103 out of the skies inwards retaliation for an incident that occurred inwards July 1988 when the USS Vincennes, mistaking an Iranian rider aircraft for a hostile plane over the Straits of Hormuz, shot downward the Iranian plane filled with civilians, killing 290. Iranian leaders vowed to “avenge the blood of our martyrs.”
• Drug runners and/or the CIA. In this version of events, “rogue” CIA agents inwards the Reagan administration, working through Oliver North, were attempting to complimentary U.S. hostages inwards the Middle East. The middlemen inwards the performance were heroin runners from Syrian Arab Republic who transported drugs to the US through Frankfurt, Germany. According to 1 “informant,” a smuggler (with the CIA’s knowledge) would depository fiscal establishment agree luggage onto a plane too an accomplice inwards the baggage subdivision would substitute an identical purse containing narcotics. (There is no explanation for the demand for ii people here, or why anyone with access to the baggage subdivision would non live able to only flora the bogus purse himself.) At whatsoever rate, Monzer al-Kassar, a Syrian drug smuggler, who was behind the operation, learned that a hostage rescue squad had discovered the smuggling operation, too that the squad was aboard Pan Am 103. PBS’s television set programme Frontline claimed inwards Jan 1990 that these “intelligence officials” were a “strong secondary target.” At that point, the diverse theories accomplish a confluence of sorts, with Jibril treatment the actual details of the bombing, switching a suitcase bomb for the drug luggage.
• Yet about other version involved Oliver North too the CIA, peculiarly every bit it related to about other aircraft explosion, over Gander, Newfoundland, inwards Dec 1985. In this iteration, a grouping of special operations forces smuggled a small-scale nuclear “backpack” bomb aboard the aircraft inwards Cairo, which they originally were to convey transported to Republic of Iraq to blow upwardly the Iraqi nuclear weapons evolution facility nether the guise of a nuclear accident. Supposedly, when these soldiers understood that their mission was a suicide mission, they backed out, but to maintain them quiet, the authorities ordered their Arrow Air DC-8 destroyed yesteryear a bomb, which caused the aircraft to crash at Gander, killing 248. The connectedness to Pan Am 103 is that supposedly the same timing device was found at each site, too inwards a missive of the alphabet to the U.S. House Intelligence Committee inwards 1998, the president of the line solid that made the timers claimed that the circuit board inwards both explosions was made for the CIA.
• There was no bomb at all. As inwards the example of TWA 800, which exploded inwards 1996, 1 theory maintains that at that spot was no bomb at all. This theory suggests that at that spot was an explosion, which has been attributed to, with other things, a shotgun or a flare gun going off, a structural defect inwards the bird causing the cabin door to rip free, or an electrical fault. Like other theories, this theory hinges on the absence of bomb fragments at the crash site, and, every bit with TWA 800, this version to a greater extent than oft than non arose from passengers inwards litigation who wanted to testify negligence yesteryear the aircraft manufacturers. In particular, rapid decom- pression theories emphasized the location inwards both Pan Am 103 too TWA 800 of the olfactory organ subdivision every bit having fallen off earlier the aircraft finally crashed, indicating an explosion separated the front end subdivision of the aircraft from the aft. Carl A. Davies, writer of Plane Truth, too John Berry Smith, a British investigator, comparison tests of Pan Am 103, TWA 800, too Air Bharat 182, found no evidence of bombtype explosions that totally demolished the subdivision inwards which a bomb was located inwards controlled bomb tests. Other “explanations” convey included an “electromagnetic high-energy slug” either deliberately or accidentally fired from Alaska.
• The Mossad. Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 sentiment pop with antisemites, this version maintains that the Mossad planted a bomb to kill Americans hence every bit to “discredit” Palestinian Liberation Organization chairman Yassir Arafat’s “peace initiative.” This version lacks the details of around of the other explanations, but soundless manages to house blame on President George Bush.
• The Palestinians. National Public Radio’s All Things Considered programme produced a “confession” inwards 1994 yesteryear Youssef Shaaban, a Palestinian who was standing trial for the killing of a Jordanian diplomat. Many observers, however, considered his confession a desperate elbow grease to make a rest on a certain expiry sentence.
• In add-on to possible guilty individuals or groups, charges were also leveled at Pan Am and/or aerodrome safety for weak safety measures inwards England.

Due to the fact that the incident occurred over Scottish airspace, the trial took house nether Scottish law, but because of the international nature of the bombing, with multiple possible locations too passengers of all nationalities, the trial was held at Camp Zeist inwards the Netherlands yesteryear means of treaty understanding betwixt Libya, the United Kingdom, too the United States.

In May 2000, the courtroom nether Scottish High Court approximate Lord Ranald Sutherland convened. The next January, the courtroom delivered a mixed verdict of guilty for Abdel Basset al-Megrahi too an acquittal for Lameen Fhima. Al-Megrahi instantly appealed. Meanwhile, the families of the Pan Am 103 flying had begun a long bespeak to sue Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for damages, overturning a traditional regulation of international law.

Allan Gerson, a old diplomat, took the example for the families and, partly every bit a number of changes inwards antiterrorism legislation next the Oklahoma City bombing, inwards 1996 the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act was amended to permit lawsuits similar Gerson’s to proceed. In 1998, a federal appeals courtroom ruled that lawsuits against Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya could proceed.

Among the victims was twenty-year-old Theodora Cohen, whose parents waged a induce to sue Libya, calling the gear upwardly on a “ghastly human activeness of war.” Susan too Daniel Cohen, Theodora’s parents, who wrote Pan Am 103, claimed that Clinton direction efforts at “normalizing” relations with Khaddafi’s Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya had interfered with prosecution of the example against the terrorist state.