September 1981 - September 27, 1981 (Sunday)

September 27, 1981 (Sunday)

• The first commercial run of the TGV high speed rail service train began, traversing the 300 mile distance between Paris and Lyons. At 6:15 am, the Train a Grande Vitesse pulled out of the Gare de Lyon in Paris with 772 passengers, then accelerated along the high speed line at Saint-Florentin at 156 miles per hour, arriving in Lyons at 9:05 am.
• The hijacking of a Yugoslavian JAT Boeing 727 was thwarted after a fire alarm was sounded and the 101 passengers and 7 crew escaped unharmed. The plane had been seized the night before during a flight from Dubrovnik to Belgrade, flew to Athens for refueling, then landed at the Cypriot city of Larnaka, where the escape took place.
• Died: Robert Montgomery, 77, American actor