How planes were hijacked in the USSR, and who dared to commit such a flagrant crime

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

According to publicly available information, in the history of the USSR there have been more than a hundred hijackings of aircraft, some of which have a happy ending. But there are also known particularly audacious, desperate, cruel crimes that culminated in the deaths of innocents and the sacrifice of the crews. Although some motives can be called noble in one way or another, disasters often occurred during their performance.

The victim of a young flight attendant and the reaction of the Turkish authorities

In October 1970, An-24 made a flight from Batumi to Krasnodar with 46 passengers on board. Vilnius store manager Pranas Brazinskas and his son sat in the front row with sawn-off shotguns. Immediately after takeoff, they called the flight attendant, demanding that the plane be turned for landing in Turkey and threatening the crew with death. Stewardess Kurchenko tried to warn the pilots and screamed, but was shot on the spot. The bandits rushed into the cockpit, opening fire. More than 20 bullets were fired, one of which interrupted the spine of the crew commander, and the legs were paralyzed.

The navigator was also wounded in the arm, lungs and shoulder. But the pilots still managed to send an SOS signal. As one of the pilots later recalled, there was an idea to send the plane to the rocks and die along with the criminals. But in the salon there were dozens of innocent people. After an unsuccessful attempt to land at a military airfield in Kabuletti, stopped by a bandit, they decided to land the car in Turkey. The Soviet Union demanded to extradite dangerous criminals, but the expected response did not follow. Turkey decided to rule the court on its own. The criminals spent only four years behind bars, after which they were released under an amnesty. They lived in the United States, and in 2002, Pranas Brazinskas was killed by his own son.

Georgian minions of fate and 4-minute assault

On November 17, 1983, a wedding thundered in Georgia. The bride was the daughter of a scientist and a relative of the secretary of the Central Committee of the Georgian Communist Party, Tinatin Patviashvili. The groom is the offspring of film director Mikhail Kobakhidze, a promising young actor Gega Kobakhidze. The next morning, while the wedding was still singing and dancing, the newlyweds headed to the airport with friends. 7 young people walked along the parliamentary corridor with TT pistols, revolvers and a diplomat converted into combat training grenades.

They learned the experience of aerial terrorists from the frames of the film about the hijacking of an airplane, and trained to shoot at Kokhabidze's country dacha. The group of terrorists also included the son of the corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences Tsereteli, the sons of the head of the department of the medical institute, Professor Iverieli, the son of the manager of the Intourist construction trust Mikaberidze and the previously convicted offspring of the director of the design bureau Tabidze. On board the Tu-134, in which the criminals boarded, there were more than 60 people. The invaders, threatening with weapons, demanded to head for Turkey. Taking the flight attendants hostage, they rushed to the pilots. The first bullet in the chest was received by the flight engineer who tried to reason with the attackers. The next clip was discharged by the representatives of the golden youth into the head of the deputy chief of the flight and navigational department. But there was a return shot from the flight engineer, who was sitting out of sight, unnoticed by the bandits.

He killed one bandit on the spot, the second was seriously wounded. The thugs panicked and, being under the influence of drugs, were completely disoriented. The commander began to rock the plane, throwing the bandits away from the cockpit. Several passengers who volunteered to resist the invaders received bullets. Fighters appeared, the board went down at the Tbilisi airport. Negotiations with the criminals were held until the morning, but only the Alpha members who arrived from Moscow were able to resolve the situation. The assault took 4 minutes. The unsuccessful hijacking claimed the lives of seven, and another 12 people were injured. The surviving terrorists were sentenced to death, only the newly-made pregnant wife Tinatin Patviashvili received 15 years in prison.

A family row of hijackers and an unsuccessful operation

Saleswoman Ninel Ovechkina raised 11 children alone (the youngest just turned 9). Seven of her sons made up the Irkutsk family jazz ensemble "Seven Simeons", well known at the city and even union level. A documentary was filmed about the Ovechkins, after which they went on tour in Japan. After seeing the foreign countries, the family decided to flee by hijacking the plane. On March 8, 1988, the whole family with the mother at the head (except for the eldest daughter, who lives separately with her husband) boarded a plane to Leningrad.

In the bodies of musical instruments were hidden sawn-off shotguns, about 100 cartridges and homemade bombs. Ninel voiced her requirements to the pilots, and they seemed to obediently began to comply. But then they put the car on one of the Leningrad military airfields, and a tough assault began. In the face of hopelessness, the criminals began to shoot: some at themselves, who helped their neighbors. Five invaders, including Ninel, died on the spot. The flight attendant and 3 passengers were killed, and 19 more received various injuries. Some Ovechkins at that time did not even reach the age of criminal responsibility.

Jealousy, alcohol and aerobatics

In the history of hijacking of Soviet planes, there was also a case built on a family drama. On a June night in 1954, the crew of the West Siberian Air Fleet was preparing for a Moscow flight. The commander of the passenger Il-12 and the navigator went to the weather station forecasters, the co-pilot went to the transportation department, the radio operator also left for organizational issues. Flight mechanic Vladimir Polyakov remained in the cockpit. Having a couple of hours left before departure, he decided to talk with his wife, who lives separately after the quarrel.

For courage, Polyakov waved the diluted alcohol drained from the tank of the anti-icing system, and went to the faithful. However, he doubted his loyalty immediately upon meeting, finding his spouse in the company of a man. Under the influence of resentment, humiliation and alcoholic intoxication, Polyakov decided to hijack an airplane ready to take off and strike at his wife's apartment. An experienced front-line pilot lifted the car into the air without any problems. He tried a couple of times to direct Il to the house, but the deep night disoriented Polyakov, and he could not afford to get to his neighbors. Without reaching the target, the pilot at the last moment pulled the plane up in meters above the roof of the building. The evacuation of residents began, Moscow demanded to persuade the distraught hijacker to plant a winged car. But persuasion worked in the opposite direction.

Polyakov, who went into a rage, began to get up on the passenger IL-12 inexplicably complex acrobatic figures, which until that moment civil aviation did not know. After unsuccessful negotiations, fighters were lifted into the air, the task of which was to lure the hijacker out of the city and shoot down. But the experienced pilot immediately guessed the intentions and did not let these plans come true. Having sober up and the charter, Polyakov landed, skillfully acting for the ship's commander, co-pilot, navigator and radio operator. For hijacking an airplane, air hooliganism, creating a threatening situation at the airport and related crimes, Polyakov was sentenced to death and placed on death row. But the respected aircraft designer Ilyushin suddenly intervened. Having learned about the unprecedented flight, tactical and technical capabilities of the Il-12, which the hijacker-flight mechanic discovered with his flight, the intercessor suggested that Polyakov should be rewarded for such a test flight. Thanks to Ilyushin, Polyakov was released 4 years later.

In the USSR, they tried not to file high-profile criminal cases. But they were. Including attempts on the life of Soviet secretaries general. Read how they ended in one of our reviews.