Previous hijack threat revealed

Press, 20 May 1987, Page 8

Previous hijack threat revealed

PA Auckland The hijack attempt on an Air New Zealand Boeing 747 aircraft at Nandi yesterday was not the first to have been planned for one of the airline’s aircraft In the 19705, the Wellington police discovered detailed plans for the hijacking in Tahiti of an Air New Zealand DCIO. It was planned to force the DCIO to fly to Mururoa Atoll, the French nuclear-testing centre. In revealing this yesterday, the airline’s former director of corporate relations, Mr Craig Saxton, said yesterday that he had called newspaper editors together to tell them of

the planned hijack. He had asked them not to print details. The police took the plans so seriously that for about three months each flight between Auckland and Tahiti carried an armed plainclothes policeman.

The police went on the alert after the plans for the hijack were found in Wellington.

Mr Saxton said the police believed the group involved was part of the anti-nuclear protest movement, but that it never found who the group was or who was its leader. They had planned to fly over Mururoa as a protest at continued French nuclear testing.

Mr Saxton was unable to date the plan exactly yesterday, but said peace ships were sailing round the area at the time. . Few airline employees were aware of the plan, “which was our first exposure to that kind of thing,” he said. Nevertheless, detailed contingency plans were drawn up to deal with such a situation, including training crew in the psychology of dealing with hijackers. An adviser from the West German airline, Lufthansa, was invited to New Zealand to set up a course for staff. That airline had been involved in several hijackings and security emergencies.