Neerja Bhanot was an Indian flight attendant, who died on Pan Am Flight 73 on 5 September 1986 at the age of 23, while saving the lives of the passengers onboard after the hijack of the aircraft.
Early Life
Born on September 7, 1962 in India, she moved to Mumbai as a child, where she finished her studies and graduated from St Xavier’s College. She was around 18 years old when she began a modelling career, when she was approached by a photographer, and became the face of several ad campaigns.
Her family arranged a wedding for her a couple of years later, with a marine engineer based in the United Arab Emirates. The wedding was finalised in 1985, however it quickly ended due to both mental and physical abuse from his part.
When Neerja went back to India to follow up on a modelling assignment, she received a letter from her husband, threatening her. She then decided to end the abusive relationship, and went back to her home-country, India.
That’s when she decided to pursue a new career. Known for her kindness, she was helping a friend in her job application process to become flight attendant with Pan Am. She decided to apply as well, which led her to be selected. She was picked in the top 80 over 10 000 applications.
Hijacking of Pan Am Flight 73
The bravery and courage she displayed on September 5, 1986, two days before her 24th birthday, saved the lives of over 300 people.
On that day, she boarded Pan Am Flight 73 as senior flight purser, a flight connecting the cities of Mumbai and of New York. At 06:00 am on a stopover in Karachi, Pakistan, for refuelling, the flight was hijacked by four members of the terrorist organisation ANO – Abu Nidal Organisation. The terrorists aimed to using the Boeing 747-121 to free Palestinian prisoners in Cyprus. They dressed up as airport security and managed to enter the tarmac and the plane, firing shots in the air.
To prevent them from being able to fly the aircraft, Neerja quickly alerted the captain, co-pilot and officers present in the cockpit about the situation, using the hijack code, who therefore managed to escape, grounding the plane on the tarmac.
The terrorists’ plan was to force the pilots to fly them to Cyprus, where other members of their group were incarcerated on terror charges.
Neerja’s actions enabled negotiations to take place, preventing the terrorists from executing their plan. It later got revealed that they then planned a 9/11 style attack on Israel using this plane. Neerja’s first heroic act already saved several lives, and continued to do so throughout the hijack.
During the long negotiations, she and the other flight attendants continued to serve the passengers with beverages and sandwiches, to help them try to keep calm and relax.
Neerja’s heroic last hours
Neerja not only reassured the passengers, she also saved their lives.
When the gunmen asked for the passengers’ passports, Neerja and the rest of the crew decided to hide American passports, sensing that the gunmen were trying to identify them, in order to bargain with the American authorities and use them as leverage.
A couple of hours later, in the chaos, she managed to remove a page of the flight manual, giving instructions on how to open the emergency door and deploy the slide, and slipped it into a magazine, which she handed over to a passenger near said door, asking them to look into it.
After the pilot left the cockpit, switching off the aircraft, several hours passed by. The plane eventually ran out of fuel, and the terrorists ran out of patience.
They opened fire and began shooting at sight on the passengers, but Neerja’s actions continued to save lives. Even though she was close to the emergency exit and could save herself, she believed that, as senior flight purser, and without the pilot present, it was her duty and responsibility to help everyone escape before doing so herself.
Neerja stayed on the plane, helping the passengers to escape and showing them how to exit the aircraft.
She died evacuating the passengers, shot point black by the gunmen.
The hijackers eventually ran out of ammunition, and the Pakistani military stormed the aircraft and arrested them. Tried and initially sentenced to death, their sentences were eventually commuted to life in prison.
Her legacy
The hijack went on for 17 hours straight, but Neerja’s quick-thinking managed to save most of the crew and passengers onboard.
There were 380 passengers present, and 13 crew members. All but 22 survived, and Neeja’s altruistic actions played a crucial role in saving people. She could have saved herself, but instead she opted for a solution that saved and reassured the majority of the passengers present.
In 1987, she was posthumously awarded Ashoka Chakra for her bravery, the highest civilian award for bravery in India, becoming the first woman to receive the award, and youngest recipient to date. The same year, she also received Tamgha-e-Pakistan, the civilian award for bravery from Pakistan, for showing incredible kindness, becoming the only woman to get awarded both by Pakistan and India.
Today, her acts of kindness and bravery are still remembered in her country.
Featured image By aussieairliners.org – http://www.aussieairliners.org/b-747i/united%20states/panam/n656pa.html, CC BY-SA 4.0, Link
Mona is a polyglot, whose curiosity led her to study the participation of women in history, which she aims at promoting through her Instagram account @adscrites.
Wow, what a courageous person! Inspiring.