People Booked Who Did Not Board
There were instances of people who were supposed to board Pan Am Flight 103, but arrived too late to do so, escaping the fate of those on board.
The Lucky Baby
Sony Mitchell was one of the youngest flight passengers who missed the flight. His father had purchased a watch at the Duty Free shop, and it took longer than expected to get the links taken out, and caused them both to miss the flight and escape death.
- The potential "271st victim"
Jaswant Basuta, a 47-year-old auto mechanic of Indian nationality, was checked in for Pan Am Flight 103, but arrived at the boarding gate too late. Having attended a family wedding in Belfast, he was returning to New York to start a new job. Friends and relatives from nearby Southall came to see him off at the airport terminal, and bought him drinks in the upstairs bar. When "gate closing" flashed on the departure screen, he hurried through security and sprinted to the gate, but the room was empty except for Pan Am ground staff who denied him access to the aircraft.
Basuta was initially considered a suspect as his checked baggage had been on the flight without him. After questioning at a Heathrow police station, he was released without charge. Twenty years later, in an interview with the BBC, he talked about his narrow escape from death: "I should have been the 271st victim and I still feel terrible for all the other people who died."
- South African foreign minister
The South African foreign minister Pik Botha and a minor delegation of 22 was supposed to board Pan Am 103, but managed to take the earlier Pan Am 101 flight. They were on their way to New York to sign the tripartite agreement whereby South Africa agreed to hand control of Namibia to the United Nations. Bernt Carlsson, the UN commissioner appointed to take over, was among the victims of Flight 103 as mentioned above.
- Air Force Wife
Mary Beth Kelleher and 2 small children Elizabeth and Matthew Kelleher were headed back to the states to spend Christmas with her family but change of plans kept her from flying that day.
- Celebrities
The R&B singing group The Four Tops had been scheduled to board Pan Am Flight 103 to return to the United States for Christmas after completing their European tour, but were late getting out of a recording session and overslept.
Cara-Lyn Lappen was a student traveling home from Africa. She was detained in Somalia while trying to board a plane and missed her connection on Pan Am flight 103.
Punk rock musician John Lydon (Johnny Rotten) of the Sex Pistols and Public Image Ltd. and his wife, Nora, were also booked on Pan Am Flight 103, but missed it due to delays.
The 1988 world tennis No. 1 Mats Wilander had made a reservation but did not take a seat on the flight.
The actress Kim Cattrall was also booked on the flight but changed her reservation shortly beforehand in order to complete some last minute gift shopping in London.
Music producer Ed Stasium and recording engineer Paul Hamingson had planned to be on the flight but were delayed while finishing a recording session with the rock band "The Muscle Shoal" at Comforts Place Studio in Lingfield, Surrey. They departed from Heathrow the following day on a different Pam Am flight.
Read more about this topic: Pan Am Flight 103
Famous quotes containing the words people and/or board:
“Very few people are acquainted with death. They undergo it, commonly, not so much out of resolution as custom and insensitivity; and most men die because they cannot help it.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“What happens in a strike happens not to one person alone.... It is a crisis with meaning and potency for all and prophetic of a future. The elements in crisis are the same, there is a fermentation that is identical. The elements are these: a body of men, women and children, hungry; an organization of feudal employers out to break the back of unionization; and the government Labor Board sent to “negotiate” between this hunger and this greed.”
—Meridel Le Sueur (b. 1900)