GERMANY: MAN ARRESTED AFTER HIJACKING A LIGHT AIRCRAFT AND THREATENING TO CRASH IT INTO THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK TOWER IN FRANKFURT

Record ID: 644543

  • Title: GERMANY: MAN ARRESTED AFTER HIJACKING A LIGHT AIRCRAFT AND THREATENING TO CRASH IT INTO THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK TOWER IN FRANKFURT
  • Date: 5th January 2003
  • Summary: (EU) FRANKFURT, GERMANY (JANUARY 5, 2003) (REUTERS) 1. GV: FRANKFURT SKYLINE 0.09 2. LV: HIJACKED LIGHT AIRCRAFT CIRCLING ABOVE FRANKFURT SKYLINE 0.22 3. LV: POLICE ON STREETS 0.27 4. VARIOUS OF HIJACKED LIGHT AIRCRAFT CIRCLING ABOVE FRANKFURT SKYLINE (2 SHOTS) 1.17 5. VARIOUS OF HIGH RISE BUILDINGS IN FRANKFURT CITY CENTRE (2 SHOTS) 1.34 6. GV: MILITARY PLANE FLYING TOWARDS HIJACKED LIGHT AIRCRAFT 1.38 7. HAS: SECURITY ON STREETS 1.43 8. VARIOUS OF HIGH RISE BUILDINGS/ HIJACKED LIGHT AIRCRAFT CIRCLING ABOVE FRANKFURT SKYLINE (5 SHOTS) 2.58 9. HAS/GV: SECURITY ON STREETS; SKYLINE AT DUSK (2 SHOTS) 3.10 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
  • Embargoed: 20th January 2003 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: FRANKFURT, GERMANY
  • Country: Germany
  • Reuters ID: LVABZ8EBWALRBCC94OLMFV8OIWTB
  • Story Text: A man hijacked a light aircraft and threatened to crash
    into the European Central Bank tower in Germany's financial
    capital Frankfurt before landing the plane and being
    arrested, officials said.



    The pilot told German n-tv television on Sunday
    (January 5) he wanted to draw attention to a female astronaut
    who died in the U.S. space shuttle Challenger which exploded
    shortly after takeoff in January 1986.

    Frankfurt airport was closed down, tall buildings in the
    city evacuated and military aircraft patrolled the sky as the
    motorised glider circled the city for more than two hours
    before landing at the airport where he was arrested.

    The incident was a chilling reminder of the September 11
    suicide attacks on the United States but a spokesman for
    Germany's air traffic control authority said he did not
    believe there was a terrorist link to Sunday's incident.

    The man did not say why he may have targeted the European
    Central Bank, based in Frankfurt, which sets interest rates
    for hundreds of millions of Europeans in 12 countries.

    A spokesman for air traffic control said the armed man
    hijacked a plane at Babenhausen airfield southeast of
    Frankfurt at 2:55 p.m. (1355 GMT) and had taken up contact
    with the Frankfurt airport tower.

    A Reuters correspondent on the scene said the plane
    circled the banking towers in the heart of Frankfurt followed
    by a helicopter. Police had sealed off main roads, evacuated
    the city's trademark tall buildings and closed bridges over
    the river Main.

    The plane was flying just a few hundred metres off the
    ground and made one close pass of the Messeturm tower that
    houses the Reuters offices and the offices of Goldman Sachs.

    Gunther Schepky, head of traffic at Frankfurt airport,
    said there were no flights into or out of the airport as of
    3:52 p.m. (1452 GMT) and that it was not known when flights
    could be resumed.

    The sight of an unauthorised plane flying among
    Frankfurt's skyscrapers conjured up frightening images that
    recalled the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States
    involving hijacked planes and subsequent incidents.

    On September 11, three planes crashed into New York's twin
    World Trade Centre towers and the Pentagon in the worst such
    attack in modern history. A fourth hijacked plane crashed in
    Pennsylvania. About 3,000 people were killed.

    Exactly a year ago, on January 5, 2002, a 15-year-old
    student pilot, Charles Bishop, flew a stolen single-engine
    Cessna into the 20th floor of the Bank of America building, a
    skyscraper in Tampa, Florida, killing himself and slightly
    damaging the building.

    On April 18 last year, a small Piper aircraft crashed into
    the 127 metre-high Pirelli skyscraper in Milan setting the top
    floors of the 30-storey building on fire. Three people
    including the pilot died.
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