If the hijacker flew the plane up to 45,000 feet and then depressurized the cabin manually (which you can do), the passengers would’ve suffered hypoxia in about 10 seconds and have died not too long thereafter. Meantime, the flight crew have separate oxygen tanks that he/they would’ve used to stay alive. It’s pretty much the quickest and most bloodless way to do a mass execution of the passengers without even having to watch it happen/march them one-by-one off the plane once landed/etc.
My money is still on this being a hijacking for the plane itself, not the passenger. They just happened to steal a plane that has the longest possible distance flown on a full tank of gas. At the weight of a flight crew, no passengers and a nuclear payload, the East Coast is well within range, even if they have to take the “long way ‘round” around the tip of southern Africa to avoid radar.
“My money is still on this being a hijacking for the plane itself”
Or the cargo.