Prison Escapees Who Made 175 People on the Plane Experience Hell

Ethiopian Airlines Flight 961 was scheduled to depart from the capital Addis Ababa on 23 November 1996 and make a connecting flight to Ivory Coast as “Addis Ababa-Nairobi-Brazzaville-Lagos-Abidjan”. If it had gone as planned nearly 12 hours It was going to be a journey.

But after the first 20 minutes With the emergence of pirates Things started to go wrong and it was a disastrous journey that caused the plane’s engines to shut down. What the pilot did was truly admirable.

There was not a single thing wrong on the day of the flight.

The weather was very nice on the day of the flight. Airlines was like Turkey’s “Turkish Airlines”. The experienced pilot’s flight time was at least 11 thousand hours. even before He was involved in 2 plane hijackings and managed to land the plane. The co-pilot had at least 6 thousand flight hours. In short, there was no reason to worry.

Most of the people on the plane, which contained 163 passengers and 12 flight crew, were on a holiday or business trip. after takeoff Everything was normal for the first 20 minutes. The pilots put the plane on autopilot and started the journey. However, at an altitude of 12 thousand meters, three of the passengers suddenly jumped up and ran towards the cockpit.

From this point on, nothing would be the same.

These young people in their 20s took the fire extinguisher and ax from the cockpit and said to the pilots: “On the plane There are 11 of us. If you don’t land the plane in Australia, we will blow this place up.”

But the plane didn’t have enough fuel to get to the destination they wanted. This is done by not loading the plane with too much fuel. It was a way to save fuel; So the pilot wasn’t lying, but of course the pirates didn’t believe him. They insisted that he take the plane to Australia.

Although the experienced captain tried to explain, the young people did not believe him and accepted it. Or rather, he feigned acceptance.

The pilot was taking the plane off the coastline of Africa. This way, in case of an emergency, he would be able to land at one of the airports in Africa. However, this trick did not last long and when one of the pirates realized that they were going in a different direction, he started shouting at the captain. The pilot had to fly the plane towards the Indian Ocean turned it over.

Meanwhile, the passengers realized that something was strange because the hijackers had already sent the co-pilot to the passengers. As a last resort, in the Indian Ocean to one of the islands The captain pilot, who was thinking of landing, was struck by the signal lights.

They had 30 minutes of fuel left and it seemed like there was no chance they could land safely in that time.

One of the engines had already shut down due to lack of fuel. pirates, to talk to the captain confidentially When they left the cockpit, the pilot immediately took the opportunity to make the following announcement:

“Ladies and gentlemen, I am your pilot. We ran out of fuel and are now losing our engine and expecting a crash landing. That’s all I have to say. All passengers to intervene against pirates I am waiting.” However, the passengers could not do anything out of fear.

After a while, the other engine shut down because there was no fuel.

There wasn’t even a light inside the plane anymore. The captain had lost his sight and they were going down quickly. The only solution now was to go down to the ocean. Conversations about those moments were obtained from the voice recorder:

Pilot: “Because of my responsibility, at least the passengers need to know the situation!”

Pirate: “Go down and increase the speed even more!”

Pilot: “Please, we are going to die. Passengers-“

Even at this moment, the pilot was trying to ensure the safety of the passengers. to calm them down and tell them what they need to do was working.

Footage of the plane landing in the ocean was recorded by someone who thought it was a flight demonstration:

The plane, which was traveling at a speed of 379 km, broke into three pieces when it crashed.

Miraculously, 50 people survived. 2 of them were the captain and co-pilot, and 4 people were from the crew. All 3 of the pirates were dead. It later became clear that There were no explosives on them, nor were they 11 people. What they called a bomb was actually a liquor bottle.

In fact, these people were prison escapees and their aim was to join their friends in Australia and start a new life. So it was all just a bluff and their escape from prison cost the lives of 125 people. However, without the professionalism of the pilot, many more people could have lost their lives.

Captain Leul later commented:

“They knew they wouldn’t make it to Australia. Only to have an accident “They wanted it.”

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