Aeroflot Flight 244
| Incident summary |
| Date |
15 October 1970 |
| Type |
Highjacking |
| Site |
en route |
| Passengers |
not known |
| Crew |
not known |
| Injuries |
several |
| Fatalities |
1 |
| Survivors |
not known |
| Aircraft type |
Antonov An-24 |
| Operator |
Aeroflot |
| Flight origin |
Batumi, Adjar ASSR, Georgian SSR |
| Stopover |
Sukhumi |
| Destination |
Krasnodar |
Aeroflot Flight 244 was the scene of the first successful aircraft hijacking in the Soviet Union[1] on 15 October 1970 when the Lithuanian nationalist Pranas Brazinskas and his son Algirdas seized an An-24 domestic passenger plane en route from Batumi, Adjar ASSR, Georgian SSR, to Sukhumi and Krasnodar to defect to the West. In a shootout with guards on board,[2] 19-year-old air-hostess Nadezhda Kurchenko was killed and several members of the crew were wounded.[1] The hijackers commandeered the plane to Trabzon, Turkey, and surrendered to the Turkish government. The Brazinskas were tried and imprisoned, but Turkey refused to cede them to the Soviet authorities.[3] The plane with its passengers was soon returned to the USSR. After spending some time in prison, in 1974, the Brazinskas were granted amnesty and made their way to the United States where they were naturalized in 1983. The memories of the incident resurfaced again in 2002, when Algirdas Brazinskas (now known as Albert Victor White) was convicted by the court of Santa Monica of murdering his 77-year-old father Pranas Brazinskas (Frank White) during a family argument.[2][4] The Soviet Union condemned the United States for granting asylum to what it termed to be "dangerous terrorists" and pressed for their extradition. Up until the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Soviet Government continued to press for the extradition of the Brazinskas, and regularly assailed what it termed American hypocrisy in harboring "terrorists who attack the aircraft of socialist countries", while pursuing very different actions against terrorists who attacked American nationals, such as in the Achille Lauro case.[5]
[edit] References
- ^ a b Korobeinikov, Dmitry (5 December 2003), Dead on Arrival. Pravda.ru
- ^ a b 1970 Hijacker Convicted of Murdering Father. Los Angeles Times. November 02, 2002
- ^ Krasnov, Vladislav (1986), Soviet defectors: the KGB wanted list, p. 125. Hoover Press, ISBN 0-8179-8231-0, 9780817982317
- ^ Hijackers' Saga: Dad Slain, Son Arrested. Los Angeles Times. February 09, 2002
- ^ Ginsburgs, George and Rubinstein, Alvin Z (1993), Russia and America: from rivalry to reconciliation, p. 171. M.E. Sharpe,
[edit] See also
- ← 1969
- Aviation accidents and incidents in 1970 (1970)
- 1971 →
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- Incidents resulting in at least 50 deaths shown in italics
- Deadliest incident shown in bold smallcaps
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