The first ever intercontinental hijacking: Vietnam veteran hijacked plane due to $ 200

31 October 1969 year 19-year-old Vietnam War veteran Raffaele Minikiello hijacked a Trans World Airlines (TWA) Boeing-707 aircraft. Writes about this with the BBC.

Фото: Depositphotos

The plane flew from Los Angeles (California) and was soon to land in San Francisco (California). However, its passengers and crew had to fly in a completely different direction. A day later, the plane was in Rome. It was the first intercontinental hijacking of a plane in history, as well as an absolute world record for the flight range of a captured aircraft.

Minichiello and the crew members he took hostage made a total of five flights (one of them across the Atlantic Ocean), flew 11 kilometers and even managed to make friends - at least that’s what it seemed to the captor.

200 dollars for the Marine

It all started with the fact that US Marine Corp. Raffaele Minikiello was underpaid with 200 dollars.

The savings bank, which paid salaries to the marines, had to pay him 800 dollars on his return from Vietnam. But when the corporal returned to his homeland, he found only 600 in his account. A veteran who served as a volunteer in Vietnam for a year, first turned to his leadership for help. But they did not help him.

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Frustrated, the former marinesman Minikiello decided to restore justice on his own and robbed the warehouse of the Camp Pendleton naval base, taking away from there 200 dollars of radio equipment and other things. And in order to avoid relying on him for robbing a prison term, he decided to hijack a plane and flee the country.

When Raffaele was 12 years old, his family immigrated to the United States from the small Italian town of Melito Irpino near Naples. This happened shortly after the town survived an earthquake in 1962. The 19-year-old Vietnam veteran decided to flee justice to his historical homeland, especially since shortly before that, his seriously ill father had returned to Italy.

Armed with a captured Chinese rifle that he brought from Saigon (Vietnam), as well as a large supply of ammunition, Minikiello bought a ticket for a TWA85 flight from Los Angeles to San Francisco for 15,50 dollars.

He hid the weapon in the toilet, and when the plane with 40 passengers took off, he took one of the flight attendants into the sight and ordered her to take him into the cockpit. There he announced to the crew that the board was captured.

How hijacked planes in 60

Civil aviation in the USA in the 60 of the XX century was not the same as it is now. It was a golden time for aircraft hijackers: passengers were not inspected during boarding, anything could be carried on board. Airlines stubbornly resisted any attempts by the authorities to introduce a check of personal belongings of passengers. The planes did not explode then, and the risk of hijacking did not seem sufficient reason to upset passengers with humiliating and lengthy procedures.

The hijackers used this with pleasure, and newspapers regularly published news about the seizures of aircraft. The aircraft were often abducted by Americans who became disillusioned with the capitalist system. Captured planes were often sent to Cuba, with which the United States broke off diplomatic relations in the early 1960's.

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Thefts have become commonplace. In 1961, within just three months - from May to August - three such thefts were committed at once. Fidel Castro, who demanded money from the Americans for the return of the ships, was especially happy about this.

Not surprisingly, some TWA85 passengers initially thought that the hijacked plane would fly to Havana. But it turned out differently.

To Rome with all the stops

Minikiello was nervous and for a long time could not agree with the crew of the plane where to fly. At first he demanded that the plane depart directly to Rome. The flight crew did not immediately manage to explain to him that there was not enough fuel in the tank for this.

They agreed that the plane was flying to Denver (Colorado), located approximately halfway between Los Angeles and New York. There the plane is refueled, and the hijacker releases the passengers and then goes to New York with a team of pilots and one of the flight attendants on board as a hostage. There is a refueling station, and then a flight to Europe.

Minichiello first demanded that flight attendant Charlene Delmonico, the one he took hostage first, stay with him. However, then her colleague Tracy Coleman volunteered to stay on board - she had a boyfriend in New York, and she hoped that the trip would end there.

The flight took place in such a calm atmosphere that the invader almost ceased to be nervous and was even polite to the hostages. When the plane landed in Denver and passengers were allowed to leave, one of them suddenly remembered that he had forgotten his Halloween costume on the seat. He asked Miniciello to return and pick him up, and he kindly allowed.

"The FBI almost ruined everything"

The three-hour flight from Denver to New York also went without incident. There were only five people on board: three pilots, the stewardess Tracy Coleman and Minikiello, who comfortably sat in the chair and even drank a cocktail of whiskey and gin.

At Kennedy Airport the plane had to refuel, change pilots and fly on - that’s what Minichiello thought. He did not know that about a hundred FBI agents were already waiting for him on the ground. Some of them are with optical rifles, ready to shoot at the first order. Others were preparing to infiltrate the ship under the guise of mechanics and disarm the hijacker.

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However, fortunately for Raffaele, an incident occurred that prevented the special services from recapturing the ship with the hostages: Minichiello’s rifle fired.

It later turned out that the shot was most likely accidental - the hijacker simply handled the weapon carelessly. The bullet hit the ceiling, miraculously missing the oxygen tank and damaging the fuselage.

But at that moment no one understood this: the pilots, who were in the cockpit and did not see what was happening, were afraid for their lives and told the ground that there would be no refueling. And they demanded that no one approach the plane - except for two international pilots who were supposed to fly with Minichiello to Europe with them.

Captain Donald Cook, who led the crew, was sincerely glad that everything happened just like that. “The FBI plan would definitely lead to the death of the entire team,” he said. “We sat with this boy for six hours and watched him go from a crazy maniac to a happy and calm guy with a sense of humor. And then these idiots, without knowing anything, made a decision on how to deal with him, and completely destroyed the trusting relationship that we had been building for six hours.”

Flight across the Atlantic

Confidence was partially restored only during the next flight. Captain Cook managed to convince Raffaele that the crew did not know what was happening on earth.

The plane made the next landing in Bangor (Maine), and there it finally refueled. By this time, the fate of the hostages was already monitored by the entire United States, and the police had to make a lot of efforts to prevent reporters from getting too close to the hijacked plane.

According to the recollections of the participants of this flight, they communicated warmly and friendly with Raffaele. He taught stewardess Tracy Coleman how to play solitaire, and Captain Cook came to talk with him about life, and during this conversation they sat on adjacent seats, and the rifle stood between them. Raffaele told him that he just wanted to return to his homeland in Italy, and that he had gotten into “some problems” during his military service.

They got across the Atlantic Ocean without incident, except that the only food on all the people on board were cakes, which were supposed to treat passengers of the TWA85 flight. But, according to the recollections of pilot Wenzel Williams, the question of what to eat did not concern everyone very much.

After a short refueling in Shannon, Ireland, the Boeing set off for its final destination - Rome. On approach to Rome, Minichiello made a demand: the plane must be parked in an area remote from the airport, and it must be met by a police representative in a car and without weapons.

Saying goodbye to the hostages, Raffaele was again courteous and even offered to throw them in a police car to the hotel, which they politely refused. Minikiello was worried that the crew could be punished for not taking his rifle from him, although they had the opportunity. Finally, he simply apologized to them for causing so many problems.

“No problem,” the crew replied. “We didn’t take it personally.”

The hijacker even wrote down Captain Cook's address in Kansas City to write a letter to him later.

“Countrymen, why are you arresting me?”

The adventures of the crew ended there, but the adventures of Raffaele continued. On Italian soil he was met by an unarmed policeman in an Alfa Romeo. Putting a rifle to the back of the policeman's head, Raffele ordered him to first wind around the outskirts of Rome and then go to Naples. But noticing that the car was being pursued by the police, he ordered it to stop in a deserted place and ran away. Hundreds of police officers, dogs and helicopters joined the search for the fugitive.

Found him in the church.

On November 2, Sunday, a day after departing from Los Angeles, Raffaele came to church. By that time all Italy was watching his flight. Even his seriously ill father, having learned from reporters what risky venture he had undertaken, promised to cut off his ears at a meeting.

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But the issue of conspiracy did not disturb Raffaele: having hidden his weapons and the American military clothes that had been on him all this time, he appeared on Sunday service in one underneath. Even if the parishioners did not watch TV, they would probably have suspected something was amiss.

“Countrymen, why are you arresting me?” - he told the police who came to pick him up. In the same surprised tone, he tried to assure the police and reporters that he knew nothing about any aircraft, although then he nevertheless told the story that Captain Cook had already heard.

What happened to Raffaele later

Raffaele's further career did not work out. After serving in prison, he tried to become a fashion model and film actor, but to no avail. At one time, it was said that he was the prototype of John Rambo, but the filmmakers denied this. For a long time he lived in Rome, worked as a bartender, married the daughter of the owner of the bar and even opened his own restaurant called Hijacking.

And in 1980, another earthquake occurred in his homeland in Irpinia - much stronger than in 1962. All of Italy helped the residents of the destroyed cities, including Raffaele Minichiello, who personally came from Rome to help the victims. Reporters then paid attention to him again: now he was no longer a charming 20-year-old boy, but an adult 31-year-old man. In new interviews, he admitted that he regrets his action 11 years ago.

In 1985, Minichiello had a misfortune: his wife died during childbirth, and the child also did not survive. To draw public attention to the problem of medical negligence, Raffaele planned a new terrorist attack - he was going to take hostage the participants of a medical conference and even found a weapon for this.

But he had a friend who attracted him to a more interesting activity - reading the Bible. Minichiello became a very devout man and remains so to this day.

Return to America

In 1999, for the first time since the capture of TWA85, Minikiello decided to visit America and meet with his comrades. By this time, he already knew that the American authorities would not pursue him.

In 2009, he even tried to arrange a meeting with his former hostages, but only the stewardess Charlene Delmonico and pilot Wenzel Williams came to her.

Minichiello was very upset when Captain Cook refused this meeting. It seemed to Raffaele that they had become friends with him. And he personally apologized to Williams and Delmonico and presented each with a copy of the New Testament. The dedicatory inscription read: “Thank you very much for your time. I thank you for forgiving my actions that hurt you. Please accept the gift of this book, which changed my life. God bless you. Raffaele Minichiello."

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Next came the inscription “Luke 23:34” - this was a reference to the verse from the Gospel: “Father! let them go, they don’t know what they are doing.”

Today, the former hijacker lives in two countries. The US authorities did not put him in jail, but because of his adventures, he does not receive benefits due to Vietnam War veterans and does not have the right to treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder.

But he got himself a small home-made airplane and a video blog in which he laid out his game on the accordion. The 174 blog has a subscriber, and the last entry appeared there four years ago.

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