Posted on 12/09/2016 9:42:39 AM PST by Kaslin
In just two weeks, it will be twenty-eight years since Pan Am Flight 103 exploded at 31,000 feet over Lockerbie, Scotland – killing all 259 passengers as well as eleven citizens on the ground. And in a little less than one week, on December 14th, the “living wounded” of Pan Am Flight 103 will finally get their day in court.
Sixteen days before this tragic act of terrorism, which included the murder of thirty-five Syracuse University students aboard, the U.S Embassy in Finland had been tipped off that a bomb was set to be placed on a plane out of Frankfurt. Obviously, the brilliant minds in Helsinki did nothing to stop this act of barbarism that eventually led to the bankruptcy of Pan Am in 1991. In fact, “U.S. officials later said that the connection between the call and the bomb was purely coincidental.” Sure, just like in 2000 when Roger Clemens hit Mike Piazza in the head at Yankee Stadium with a vicious fastball that caused him to miss the All-Star game. Watch this and tell me if you think that too was “purely coincidental.” But I digress.
In 2008, Libya finally had to pony up and pay the families of the U.S. Lockerbie victims. But the game was hardly over, since the George W. Bush Justice Department negotiation gave Libya “immunity in U.S. courts from further terror claims once the funds had been paid,” according to an October 31, 2008 report by ABC News.
And that brings us to today.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Interesting, I know one of those pilots. I knew he didn’t get most of his pension, and although he invested wisely, he has twin severely autistic sons now in middle age, and the pension would be put to good use.
Pan American was a great international airline. Unfortunately, they never had a grasp of the hub and spoke US market. I remember one of the first 707s was on the Tokyo-San Francisco run.
Arriving in California, we transferred to United, in a DC-6...
Wow, I didn’t realize that. Very sad. Where would the money to make these pilots whole come from? I wonder if these pilots were a member of a Licensed Protected Victim Group if they would be made whole. Even though they do look like Obama’s own Grandpa.
I had a friend at the time whose college friend died in that crash. She died herself a few years later getting hit by a truck in Manhattan.
Don't play in the street. Good advice from the 50's.
Prior to deregulation, Pan Am was prohibited by law from having domestic routes with a few exceptions like JFK-SFO and SFO-HNL. They bought National Airlines to help with feed, but their tote structure, mostly the northeastern US to Florida, didn't help much.
I think actually Braniff might have been a better acquisition. They had a substantial fleet of 727's, and were positioned with their hub at the most modern airport in the US in the middle of the country.
Trying to remember if Braniff merged with TWA ?
Do you also remember the idea was to land helicopters on the roof to whisk passengers to JFK airport. I seem to remember one of them lost a rotor and the practice was stopped.
Time for a strike. /s
Most of the 727 fleet was eventually bought by American Airlines. The American 727 fleet was already drawing down in 2001 due to higher fuel consumption and maintenance costs. The 9/11 attacks drastically cut demand for air travel, so the 727 fleets from all the US airlines were quickly grounded after 9/11 and retired. Those that weren’t scrapped were sold mostlt6 overseas.
One of my best trips ever was a PHX to TYS connecting in STL.
Pan Am free upgrade to first on an L1011 and then a puddle jumper with 8 people on board and a free cooler of beer.
That trip was a hoot. Also no TSA.
That was New York airways which flew from JFK, LaGuardia, roof of Pan Am Bldg. and Newark airport.
I flew it a number of times and landed on top of the Pan Am Bldg. to do business in the WTC.
I was scheduled to fly it the day it crashed on the Pan Am Bldg. but was delayed and I missed the flight.
Did not know anything about it until the next morning when I read about it in the paper and made a hasty phone call to my wife and work that I was alive and well.
I went to Syracuse, and this was a tragedy not only for the families and for Pan Am, but for the university.
I flew on Pan Am many times during the "glory days."
Today, the air travel experience is a torture fest by comparison.
I see they had scads of 727s. Bet Northwest Airlines picked them up.
That’s damned near all they flew out of Mpls.
Those four must have studied hard to learn to stand that way, all with the same smile, the hands held just so, the weight balanced on the right foot with the left knee slightly forward. They don’t even look real.
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