The Hijacking Of Flight 8969 | Mayday S2 EP3 | Wonder

[Music] [Music] we are in an emergency [Music] a giant aircraft stands on the tarmac at marseilles in france it's been taken over by hijackers who are preparing the worst terrorist atrocity the world has so far seen the men are heavily armed and carrying powerful explosives the french prime minister faces a terrible dilemma storm the plane lose 173 passengers and crew but let it take off and there'll be an even bigger price to pay this will become a blueprint for defeating a terrorist hijacking with eyewitness testimony and video recordings this is the inside story of the hijacking the world for god [Music] it's christmas eve 1994 an air france jet is on final approach to algiers airport it's the early morning flight from paris to this former french colony on the north coast of africa the plane is an airbus a300 with a crew of 12 on board three greens this is no ordinary landing algeria is in a state of civil war the area around the airport has been the scene of fierce fighting there's a very real threat of missiles being fired at the plane as it comes into land the flights to algiers are only done by volunteers because of the terrorist threat we're all aware of it we accept the risk so dangerous is it that air france the french state airline has asked its government if it really needs to continue these flights to algiers so far there's been no reply 100 feet 50 feet 20 feet [Music] the captain of air france flight 8969 is bernard a highly experienced pilot this is his first ever television interview the events are still so threatening to him that he'll only appear in silhouette [Music] there were some security measures like on any other flight and a few extra ones since we were in algiers but at my level i had no qualms about flying there even now 10 years later i can still say that i like doing an algiers the plane will only be on the ground for the short time it takes to clean refuel and board the passengers for the return flight they're mostly algerians but many are french escaping for a while the perils of life in algeria three years earlier islamic fundamentalists had won the elections there hoping to install an islamic state but then the military seized power and imprisoned their leaders since then algeria has descended into chaos like every other year i decided to come and spend the holidays in france and i had a cousin with me i was chief stewardess at air algeria and i wouldn't take any other flight but air algeria normally but when i arrived at the airport there were no seats left the flight was full but an air france booking agent suggested that i take the air france flight so i did at least i'd be certain of taking off boarding is nearly over but then another sign of the fraught security situation police board the plane for one more check presidential police youtube take the rear police nobody move please presidential police were carrying out an identity check no you stay here we'll handle it it'd be best if i made an announcement okay go ahead ladies and gentlemen good day this is your captain speaking there will be a short delay while the police will come to the cabin to carry out a passport check please remain seated and we apologize for the inconvenience we should be on our way shortly fastball this unauthorized delay to flight 8969 is making the military suspicious algerian special forces known as the ninjas are already heading towards the plane i looked outside and i could see the ninjas out there the algerian special forces i said to myself why are there so many of them means infidels and when he said that i knew straight away that they were terrorists there it was all of you get to the back hurry shut that voice of satan sit down you two don't move nobody move we are not the police we are mujahideen the men are not police but terrorists they belong to a violent group of muslim extremists they aim to force an islamic state on algeria no matter what it takes and seizing the plane is part of that plan when that happened it was like a rock falling like lead i don't know which it was horrifying look at this this is a very powerful one there are others just like it ready for a great fireworks show in the sky we are the virginian of the people god has chosen us to die and you to die with us the leader 25 year old abdul abdullah yahya is a notorious killer there is nothing to fear god awaits us all in his heavenly paradise [Music] outside news spreads quickly and reporters arrive at the scene in paris the french prime minister is urgently recalled from his christmas holiday it's an international crisis i spent the whole afternoon on the phone trying to find out exactly what was going on it was pretty confused the algerian authorities were determined to get tough and it was difficult to discuss the problem with them back in algiers the terrorists decide to put on the flight crew's uniforms to confuse any army snipers meanwhile in the cabin one of the terrorists is not happy with what he sees cover your head cover your head more sitting next to each other and above all women with their heads uncovered that was intolerable for latvi and it threw him into a rage lotvey's character is very peculiar we called him the madman because really he was always on a knife edge he had fits of rage he was always on the brink of fury what he saw there in the cabin was intolerable for him he had to cover these women up now two hours into the hijacking the terrorists want to talk to the algerian military you're in the tower we have taken control of this air france flies we are the armed islamic group do you hear me do you understand do you hear me what is wrong with this thing they don't hear me they couldn't hear you because you both talked at the same time you have to start again you tell them do it alphonse 8969 what do you want me to say the terrorists order captain delem to take off for paris they say they're going to hold a press conference there but the plane can't move the passenger boarding stairs are still attached and the algerian authorities have parked vehicles to block the runways the passenger boarding stairs are still in place please remove them immediately they meet with a blank refusal things are starting to go wrong for the hijackers the algerian strategy is not to give way on a single point but it's a dangerous policy as they are soon to find out we are going to block the whites armed terrorists have hijacked an air france jet at algiers airport they want to leave for paris but the government won't let them it's a stalemate for the moment i'll say it one more time please remove the boarding stairs so that we can leave for paris you think we are joking we will show you how we are joking we are soldiers of god we are ready to die we will show them the terrorists are about to send a message to the algerian government during the passport check they've identified among the passengers an officer of the algerian police behind me there was a policeman can you come with us please we need your help he asked the policeman to follow him it's crazy i don't know if he knew but he was very hesitant he was walking but reluctantly because he didn't know what was going to happen to him open the door please so please take our message to the government [Music] few passengers are aware of the murder nor are the pilots the first contact we were allowed with the cabin was when a stewardess was allowed into the cockpit to see if we wanted anything i said we'd like a glass of water because it was hard to swallow as you can imagine our throats were very dry just then she whispered to me they've already killed the passenger i was dumbfounded because we had no idea we'd heard nothing but the passengers are growing more concerned about what's going on outside there are signs that the algerian special forces are preparing for an armed assault the biggest worry that we all had was that the ninjas the algerian special forces would attack the plane things were going on inside the plane sure but anything that would come from the outside would upset things and that scared us as french interior minister at the time charles pasqua knows exactly how the ninjas operate they were trained by us we were taking a considerable risk by letting this plane stay in algiers because we knew that although the algerian forces were perfectly capable of ending the siege it would have ended in a bloodbath philosophy the algerian military maintain their hard line so the terrorists are about to raise the stakes again another passenger must die when they came for the second passenger we knew things were going wrong this passenger he was different he was vietnamese a diplomat he was the real foreigner on this plane this passenger was not cowed by their terror and that must have bothered them the vietnamese diplomat believes that as an outsider he's being released [Music] oh the stewardess went back to the cabin and came back with a bottle of water and some glasses she served us and whispered it's not one now it's two immediately i realized that we had really hit the jackpot [Music] as the hours go by the crew and passengers begin to recognize the different personalities of the four men [Music] to make things simpler we gave them names yaya gave us his name straight away so that was easy he was in charge he looked a little bit like a student he was friendly enough very calm except when he flew into a rage and then he would act like a gangster lotfe the madman was the one who insisted we follow their laws the one who was the most fanatic the most fundamentalist [Music] he'd already been in prison and been tortured he had a hatred of the government and he had a very short fuse he was the dangerous one the real psychopath [Music] the third one didn't have a name we called him bill he was a little bit similar he wondered what he was doing there and he could see him wondering the same thing it was an error in casting he was more of a goat herd than a terrorist then finally there was the killer [Music] it was he who did the shooting and who cleaned his gun afterwards without any remorse or feeling the killer in the group is becoming increasingly bizarre the tallest one the killer when we passed each other on the plane he would take me by the neck and kiss me on the forehead and later on the meaning of this was more or less confirmed to me people told me that this could be seen as the kiss of death finally plucks up enough courage to voice his fears can i say something uh yeah i want to ask you a favor if you if you decide to kill me i i want you to promise me i don't want to be killed by a bullet in the back because when i die i i want to be able to see your face what are you afraid of was it's impossible not to be afraid with what's going on on the plane you don't need to worry because if i kill you you will be a martyr you will go straight to paradise i can tell you that it didn't make me feel any better in algiers it's stalemate neither side is giving way in paris the french leaders are frustrated they believe their own special forces could bring the hijacking to a safe end but the algerians refused to let foreign troops in to sort out an algerian problem i asked the algerian authorities extremely forcefully and urgently to let the plane take off because i considered that it was a french plane belonging to air france which although it had on board a majority of algerians had dozens of french there too so it was for us to solve the problem nightfalls air france flight 8969 is pinned down by spotlights the passengers have now been held hostage for seven hours initial panic has given way to a tense calm few realize that two passengers have been murdered the crew is working hard to defuse the situation well these buttons like uh here for instance it's uh the apu auxiliary power unit the role of a crew in these conditions is to keep things calm to earn trust to keep things going which is very important at the start of hostage taking it's always violent you have to buy time to calm people to show what you're like to find out who they are and there was the conversion to islam of two stewardesses of whom i was i don't have any disrespect for believers but if it could help calm the terrorists down then i didn't have any problem faking a [Music] through the night the threats and ultimatums continue but the algerian government will not give in it's a battle of wills at one point it was quite calm i made a tour of the cabin about two in the morning [Music] there were two of them lying on the floor between door one left and or one right i thought look two of them are asleep one's at the rear there's only one in the cockpit if an assault took place now maybe it wouldn't be so bad but that's as far as it went after a restless night the passengers wake up it's christmas morning it was a marvelous gesture there was one person we called father christmas because he said you've worked hard enough now it's my turn and he took round all the bottles of water and glasses to the passengers the passengers joined in that's to say they tried to eat something to do normal things to make the atmosphere a little bit more normal and a little less stressful than it really was it was the waiting because in reality we could do nothing but wait during the night the french government has decided to send its special forces to the island of majorca as close to algeria as possible without being accused of interfering colonel denis favier was then a major in charge of the french counter-terrorist unit the ggn since the hijacking it's feared that terrorists have put a price on his head and he doesn't want his face to be seen the decision was taken to send gign to majorca an air france aircraft was put at our disposal identical in every respect of the hijacked aircraft as well as an experienced crew who knew the technical side all the details of the plane on route to majorca major favi's men have familiarized themselves with every detail of the a300 airbus in the expectation that they will get the chance to attack the plane back in algiers the terrorists release some passengers mainly women with young children or people with serious medical conditions but there are still over 170 people on board a handful for the four young terrorists and the passengers are not who they thought they would be i don't know how the terrorists organized their business certainly put a lot of thought into it they obviously wanted to seize a symbol of france and air france is a national symbol but perhaps they didn't realize that in an air france plane at algiers most of the passengers would be algerians 138 of the passengers are algerian citizens the terrorists offer to release them leaving only the french nationals on board a gruesome indication perhaps of their final plan however the algerian passengers refused to leave it's true that in algiers they were going to free some of the passengers and they refused to get off i think that one of them said if we leave then afterwards they're going to kill the crew so i'm going to stay i think that this man was sincere i can't explain it but it was the truth the algerian government has another trick up its sleeve they've managed to identify the terrorist leader yahya and bring his mother to the microphone to try to weaken her son's resolve the algerian government's tactic misfires it sends yahya into a boiling rage they went and got my mother can you imagine that my mother they wouldn't enjoyed my mother over here how many friends are back there no one man and woman go get the man what do they think they're playing at what do they think they're doing [Music] [Music] until now the terrorists haven't targeted any french citizens but their time has come two staff members of the french embassy are on board a secretary and a young chef okay now we will teach you how to play games with us are you listening to me you tell them that if they don't let the plane take off we will kill every single passenger one by one tell them my name is yanique bernier i work at the embassy they're threatening to kill us if you do nothing let's start the executions you've got to do something and quickly quick as you can we care nothing for you we are soldiers of god we'll kill him and we'll throw him outside the door you can come and pick him up get me a magazine he was terrified yanik he was looking at me but he was terrified was he pleading with me to help him was he you too we're better off going back to your places i was saying to myself no it's not possible it can't happen like this it's not possible [Music] [Music] the door open warning light confirms that the terrorists have carried out their threat they have phone safe 969 you're happy now see what you get when you play tough we witnessed at a distance the execution of this man it was something we lived through with great emotion in paris because we were patched into the conversations between the plane and the control tower the french government can no longer stand by and do nothing prime minister baladur gets on the phone and threatens his algerian counterpart i told him that i would hold the algerian government responsible for what happened and make it known to international opinion threat works the algerian president caves in finally after 39 hours of terror flight 8969 can lead for france just then there it was we could leave in the plane there was a joy you could not imagine and really this impression that that was it we'd succeeded we had all succeeded and we were going to be saved we were leaving algiers but there's a problem all the time they've been on the ground the captain has kept the auxiliary power unit running it's a small jet engine in the tail of the plane which keeps the power supply going it uses around four tons of fuel a day now there isn't enough to reach paris only marseille on the southern coast of france navigation lights on air conditioning packs flight 8969 prepares to take off the crew are relieved to be going home both they and the passengers believe that whatever the future holds it can't be as bad as what they're leaving behind they don't realize the horror that awaits them after two days of terror and the death of three passengers the algerian authorities are allowing flight 8969 to leave for france the terrorists say they're going to hold a press conference there before takeoff checklist completed [Music] but captain delem wants an urgent word with the terrorist leader what is it what's wrong look since the start of this whole thing i followed your instructions you want to get to paris to talk to the journalists i'll take you there but i want to know if you're going to blow up the plane between algiers and marseille why do you ask if i'm gonna blow up the plane because the responsibility for these passengers is on my shoulders no there's nothing to worry about for you or the passengers we fly to marseille like you said refuel the tanks and then we go to paris i give you my word all right good let's go me i believe them when they told me that the plane would not be blown up between algiers and marseille i don't know if they would have given me the same answer between marseille and paris when someone's got explosives they're not for making a birthday cake we have two terrorists strapped in their seats in the cockpit and they're so excited they're like kids excited happy what's more they succeeded at 3 30 in the morning on the 26th of december the plane approaches marseille airport they're unaware that major denis favier and his french special forces have got their ahead of them from majorca and are now planning a showdown normally you arrive on ground that's held by the enemy but here it's the enemy who's going to arrive on ground where you are in total control and that's a key element in the success of the operation 50 feet for the terrorists it's the magic moment we are landing in france we'll get fuel we'll get provisions to take off again and go to paris because that's the objective the airport is very dark there are the lights of the plane and the little car the follow me car which we follow and we do not go to the terminal the plane is being deliberately led away to a remote corner of the airfield tension is very high because the french government has received some alarming news while the plane was flying towards france we received other information according to which the terrorists plan to use the plane to carry out an attack on paris the information was credible and we took it seriously so the decision was made that no matter what the plane would not take off from marseille no matter how high the price may be the plane would not take off we picked a very precise spot for the plane to park and then we just played for time [Music] the french tactics will now be dictated by major favi his plan is to wear the terrorists down whilst always appearing conciliatory the french will spin out negotiations as long as possible they know that yahya and his men must be tired the hijacking has now gone on for almost two days airphones eight nine six nine we require immediate refueling 27 tons 27 tons the terrorists have learned from the flight crew that 27 tons of fuel will fill the tanks far more than the nine tonnes needed for the journey to paris it appears to confirm the intelligence report that the plane is to be used as a fire bomb they say it's not possible because of the killings because of what happened in algiers it's in all the papers the workers who do the refueling are afraid they won't come near the plane tell them we want to go now we'll do a press conference in paris alphonse 8969 they want to leave for paris right away they wish to hold a press conference in paris they say why go to paris while all the international presses come here to massey they're all here why do we press conference in paris there's no point we can do it here on the plane major favier has baited the hook will yahya bite tell them we want cnn tell them we want cnn alfonso said 969 they want to speak to cnn the terrorists agree to a press conference aboard the plane little realizing that it's all part of a clever plan tactically this press conference was important because it enabled us to get some of the passengers moved to the rear of the plane the negotiators asked that the front of the plane be cleared for the press conference the real reason is to create a clear area for the french special forces when they storm the plane because what the terrorists don't realize is that the plane's doors can be opened from the outside are they coming no not yet by now the plane has been sitting on marseilles taxiway for 12 hours the french special forces know how many terrorists there are and where they are it's believed the french special forces planted microphones on the fuselage of the plane now they're waiting for the sun to go down to take advantage of the dark on the plane they know nothing of this they're still waiting for the press to arrive tower 8969 everything's ready here you can send the press now eight nine six nine what what do you mean they're not ready no no no no no no you said they were ready over an hour ago when you were going to get them come on there's not much time left there must be hundreds of journalists there this will be the biggest group of their careers they're up to something we can't stay here i assure you it's it's captain move the plane over there i promise you we'll be captain move it right now do it move the plane over there where the other ones are we'll be fine move the planes go over there where the other ones are do it do it let's go start engines suddenly all colonel favier's plans are in disarray yahya the terrorist leader now has the initiative tactically for us the situation was very bad our positions were based on the plane being parked at point a and all of a sudden it's at point b so we have to reorganize very quickly captain delem is forced to park right at the foot of the tower close to the terminal and other flights if they blow up the plane now the casualties could be enormous tell him it's too late now there won't be a press conference it's too late it should have been done tell us to feel the tanks we're leaving they have until five o'clock at five o'clock we're taking off tell them captain do it i've had it do it alphonse eight nine six nine major favier is having his men picked up as fast as possible to move to new positions he puts snipers on the terminal roof where they'll have a view of the cockpit he only has a few minutes to set up his emergency plan a cavalry charge of passenger boarding stairs three air stairs and thirty men this is the plan penetrate by the two rear doors with two teams of eleven men each at the rear right and rear left doors and then a penetration by a smaller team of eight men at the front right door to gain control of the cockpit since we know that the terrorist leader is in the cockpit our intention is to cut off the cockpit from the rest of the plane by five o'clock no fuel has been delivered the authorities have no intention of allowing the plane to take off [Music] five o'clock comes round and there it's the moment when yaya has to do something yahya enters the cabin to choose his fourth victim but he seems reluctant [Music] he chooses a member of the crew the youngest the most foreign who had made the mistake of telling him he was an atheist [Music] i don't want to do this but i got no choice [Music] i don't know what was going on in yaya's head and we never will i don't know if he changed his mind but he kept putting off this execution so instead of that he fired on everything around the hijackers know they are in the endgame but then they discovered there was a public address and they started reciting verses from the quran it was very difficult because it was the prayers for the dead we had to prepare ourselves for death we were going to die as martyrs god was waiting for us there was silence and all of a sudden it was a state of panic the terrorists know the french negotiators are in the control tower they decide to send them a message one of the terrorists opened the side window of the cockpit and hosed down the control tower the glass shattered all around us we were literally machine-gunned since we had landed in marseille there had been some moments of tension but nothing like what seemed to be about to happen we're going to succeed in our mission captain don't worry about that major favier has been given carte blanche by the french prime minister eduard baladur he decides the moment has come to act when the terrorists started firing with an automatic weapon on the tower there was danger inside the plane so we now had justification for an armed attack that attack was carried out from the air stairs which are mobile vehicles the cavalry charge is underway this is actual footage of the attack there are eight of us on the front right air stair the first air stair gets to the aircraft there's a small problem with the height as it was a little bit higher than the than the door the door hits the top of the air stairs a slight step back the door opens the air stair touches the plane and the group goes in then it's the apocalypse and then the group that has gone in comes under a deluge of fire from the terrorists who shoot at everyone who enters an extremely murderous fire there's not a moment's doubt about the nature of this gunfire they are shooting to kill at the rear of the plane the other two squads of favier's men enter [Music] the situation we were in was extremely violent so i pulled the overcoat i had over my head so i wouldn't see the tracer bullets whizzing past nor what was going on around hundreds of bullets are whistling through the cabin grenades are exploding there's smoke and confusion everywhere i was in a rather bad spot so i tried to make myself as small as possible you stop breathing and you imagine that you're hard enough to stop the bullets the snipers on the terminal roof can see the terrorists in the cockpit but frustratingly can't get a clear shot the co-pilot is blocking their view but that problem is about to be solved [Applause] actual video footage shows the co-pilot jean-paul bordelli falling onto the hard concrete yet he still manages to stagger away to safety it gives the snipers the chance they've been waiting for go go at the rear of the cabin the french special forces is evacuating the passengers through a hail of gunfire but cabin steward christophe moran finds himself unable to escape i tried to take with me a woman a passenger who had been sitting next to me but she was too fat she could not come so we just held hands unbelievably only a few minutes after the assault began most of the passengers have been rescued by now only one terrorist is left alive but he's going down fighting there was only the flight engineer and me left in the cockpit we looked at each other and there's just this one terrorist he looks at us one after the other his three colleagues are here dead or nearly so out of spite he could have killed both of us he didn't what more can i say i think that after 54 hours there is mutual recognition and respect quote unquote between the terrorists and the hostages yes bonds were created in this drama and i think these bonds were activated and that they perhaps contributed to saving the lives of some members of the crew the french news footage captures amazing scenes of the battle the xi'an man is blasted out of the plane by gunshots the final surviving terrorist holds them at bay for almost 20 minutes but his time and his ammunition are running out [Applause] the flight engineer and i looked at each other we knew exactly the situation we were in as long as there were gunshots we knew we could die but once it stopped or when we thought it had stopped then we said all right it's over but it's not over yet for the captain and his flight engineer the jigen are not sure who are the terrorists and how many are still alive everyone is suspect the battle around the cockpit has been so fierce that everyone believes the flight crew are dead the french special forces suspect that any survivors may be terrorists in disguise the flight engineer is hustled off the plane and handcuffed get up hands on your head i'm the captain of the plane now we'll get out but not with my hands on my head i would never have left the cockpit with my hands on my head after all i have been through i would not be punished like a child his shirt was covered in blood he said i'm deaf i'm deaf but we said yes but you're alive we told them he's our flight engineer let him go [Music] for 20 minutes the gun battle has raged on board the crowded aircraft hundreds of shots have been fired numerous grenades exploded yet all 173 passengers and crew have survived captain delem himself escaped with bullet wounds to his right elbow and thigh [Music] the crew had a specific responsibility the duty to save the hostages and to safeguard the plane the crew in general and the captain in particular they all rose to the occasion nine of the 30 ggn men have been wounded one seriously when i assessed the gravity of the gig and men's injuries and when we learned that none were fatal then yes i could consider that the operation overall had been a success out of the 161 passengers who survived the hijacking only a few have suffered slight injuries a huge relief to the french prime minister i cannot say that i was calm that day but i considered that there was no other decision to be made than the one i took so the only thing that was left for me was to hope that things would unfold well and as a matter of fact they unfolded exceptionally well i would not have dreamed that they would go that well all the french special forces and the crew members received high national honours for their courage for a long time i kept seeing the faces of the three dead passengers that i couldn't save then when the time of the medals came i realized that i had helped save 170 people it's a lot more gratifying and it allowed me to mourn and get over it i don't wear the medal but i'm proud of having it and i consider that we deserved it we only did what we were supposed to our job it was a textbook mission one of the most successful anti-terrorist operations ever carried out but the traumatic experience will never leave the survivors [Music] zahida kakachi the passenger could not stay in algeria she became so anxious about her safety she emigrated to france stewardess claude bernier was thanked by her france but never worked for them again [Music] christophe moran suffered the same fate since this horrific experience his outlook on life has changed radically he now works for a charitable organization [Music] captain delem eventually returned to flying duties after a further nine years of service he's recently retired from air france later a former leader of the algerian terrorist groups omar chiki confirmed that the plan had been to blow up the plane over the eiffel tower the symbol of the french nation hundreds might have been killed when the plane crashed down onto the crowded streets of paris they never tried again and the world would forget this hijacking until seven years later i went to do some shopping and i bumped into a friend who said a plane has crashed into the world trade center i went home and stayed sitting in front of the television for 24 hours i couldn't move or eat or do anything all those images came back to me and i asked myself is that what was supposed to happen to [Music] us i was convinced that the terrorists wanted to crash the plane over paris to them it would have been a great feat crashing a plane on the eiffel tower or the elysee palace would be an extraordinary feat [Music] above all i kept thinking we had apprentice terrorists boys who didn't understand very well what they were doing but voila they taught everyone a lesson foreign

Channel: Wonder

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Keywords: Wonder, wonder channel, survivial videos, survival stories, i shouldn't be alive, wonder i shouldn't be alive, outdoor channel, extreme documentary, air crash investigation, air crash investigation 2020, seconds from disaster, mayday, mayday plane crash, plane crash doc, plane crash documentary, plane crash disaster, plane crash investigation, Flight 8969, air france flight 8969, air france, air france safety video, air france flight 8969 documentary

Id: mLW6ZOKbq3Y

Length: 51min 41sec (3101 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 29 2021