Thursday, April 10, 2014

Pan Am Flight 103 Air Crash Investigation Results

By Anita Ortega


Investigators worked for years to solve the mystery of the Pan Am Fight 103 that came down 38 minutes after takeoff on its way to Detroit through London from Frankfurt. Pan Am Flight 103 air crash investigation team camped at Lockerbie in Scotland to unravel the mystery surrounding the death of 259 people on board and 11 on the ground. Preliminary investigations pointed at a bomb that was planted in the luggage section. The luggage could have found its way into the plane in Frankfurt.

The plane was traveling 31,000 feet when the bomb exploded. Investigations revealed that Libyan terrorists were responsible. The conclusions followed the gathering of thousands of pieces and information about the plane. It had to be reassembled in a warehouse to establish major facts. This was billed to be the most dangerous attacks in history and attracted a lot of attention.

The conclusion that Libyans were involved resulted from years of evidence collection. After three years, two Libyans, Khalifa Al-Amin and Baset Abdel were implicated with the terrorist act. The judges ruled that Khalifa did not commit the crime and was therefore set free. Abdel was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison. The government was to take responsibility by paying 2.7 billion dollars.

The Air Accident Investigation Branch in UK handles all accidents on its airspace. They took over the case and combed an area of approximate 2000 square kilometers where they collected over 4million pieces of debris. They had to use the support of computers to document every piece that was collected.

When the theory that terrorism was involved emerged, investigators termed the crash as a criminal act. They found traces of RDX and PETN, chemical compounds that cause a Semtex explosion to occur. The most likely point of entry for the bomb was Frankfurt. Local police, FBI and Scotland Yard were involved in the investigations.

The entry of Americans into the investigations was because of the 189 citizens who formed part of the 270 people on board. Such a huge figure of deaths was only overtaken by the terrorist attack on 9/11. Court proceedings witnessed the presentation of 3,500 photos, 180,000 pieces as evidence and the testimonies of 15,000 people. 20 countries were covered during investigation. Libya took responsibility after UN imposed sanctions.

The investigations and trial broke the record for the most expensive exercise. A total of 60 million dollars was spent with 230 people presenting their evidence in person. Court transcripts topped 10,000 pages with the entire trial taking a record 89 days. There was a claim that the trials took a political angle which dimmed any hopes of finding the truth. Libya was claimed to be a scapegoat while the real perpetrators were Iranians with the aid of Palestinians.

Iran entered into the picture because 290 of its citizen civilians were killed in the Persian Gulf when America brought down its plane. It is also believed that Libya was coerced into taking responsibility for political reasons. Some powers sort to make political or ideological gains by implicating Libya. This means that the truth about the crush may never be known.




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