Aerial Hijack Exercise
During this time, Captain Sarp Yalgin later expressed his horror that the Cabin
made the emergency call to instruct the Chief had “accidentally” poured an entire
authorities on the ground that a hijacking bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label
was taking place. Shortly thereafter, the whiskey away to prevent him drinking it!
Turkish Air Force dispatched two F-16 The Green Light hijacking team had
fighter jets to flank the kidnapped aircraft. come up with a list of demands, typical of
Within minutes, our plane was being this type of situation in reality; they
guided back towards the runway at included the re-fuelling of the plane,
Istanbul, the hijackers having failed to gain clearance to depart Istanbul, provision of
entry to the cockpit and divert the flight to meals for the hostages, the release of a
their desired destination. prisoner from an Italian jail, and financial
What followed on the tarmac was a very compensation of $1million per hijacker’s
long siege, with extended periods of family in cash.
boredom for the passengers, interspersed Each of the hijackers, including a
with moments of intimidation, verbal abuse “sleeper”, portrayed different personalities
and a level violence which appeared very for the sake of the exercise and they
realistic, to the credit of the
actors. During this time, the
differing personalities and back
stories developed amongst both when demands were not heeded
the hijackers and the planted or a passenger antagonised
actors amongst the passengers; one of the hijack team.
the idea of the latter was to After the First Officer
instigate reaction from the other attempted to grab a gun off one
passengers on board, to test and of the hijackers in the cockpit,
gauge their reactions. he was shot in the leg, and
It emerged that the hijackers subsequently moved into the
were acting in the name of ‘Army cabin. Discussions then took
Families in Arms’, a British place between the hijackers
reactionary group opposed to the and the crisis centre on how
deployment of western forces in best to get a doctor on board.
Iraq. The hijackers had lost loved The First Officer was eventually
ones in the conflict in Iraq and moved away from the plane by
felt that the United Kingdom had failed to managed to create the various syndromes ambulance. The hijackers then began to
compensate families affected associated with captivity on board a fall apart when they realised the aircraft
appropriately in what they perceived hijacked jet – London Syndrome, could not be flown without a First Officer
to be an immoral war to which Turkey Stockholm Syndrome and John Wayne on board.
had been complicit. Syndrome. They also wore clothing that Six of the passengers escaped in a
There was considerably more activity in tested released “hostages” ability to recall catering truck, whilst some of the other
the cockpit where negotiations began with detail when being interrogated by the passengers posted notes in the widows
the crisis centre after the door of the authorities; one wore an Ipswich Town top, alerting the authorities outside to the
cockpit had been opened by the pilot (as being a harder soccer team name to recall, situation on board. Negotiations secured
directed to do once the flight had landed for Turkish participants, than the more the release of some of the passengers
for the sake of the exercise), who did a familiar Chelsea or Manchester United. (who were reluctant to leave the exercise!),
great job of trying to calm the hijackers Once the hijackers felt that they were in full yet they were debriefed by the authorities
down. Credit was also due to the cabin control of the airliner, they relaxed the on the ground.
crew on board, who were called upon to atmosphere for the hostages, allowing One of the most frightening aspects of
translate demands and statements to the them to use the toilets one by one (with the the exercise was the targeting and
rest of the hostages, often with a gun door kept open!), and even read or sleep. intimidation of individual passengers,
pointed to their heads. One of the hijackers Yet, periodically the tension was ramped up mostly over issues of nationality.
Hostages indicated the location of bombs to the authorities by placing notes behind the window shades
Aviationsecurityinternational February 2009 www.asi-mag.com 25
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