Remembering Cathay Pacific Flight 700Z Crash.

[Carl Robinson]

The present search drama around missing Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370 from KL to Beijing -- and Vietnam's involvement -- recalls an incident in June 1972 when a Cathay Pacific Convair 880, reputedly the toughest airliner ever built, exploded and crashed near Pleiku in then-South Vietnam's Central Highlands. I'm sure some Old Hacks would have covered that story, as AP certainly did.  A pretty grisly scene too with looting quickly taking place.  

CX700Z was enroute from Bangkok to Hong Kong when an explosion ripped through the aircraft with all 81 on board killed.   The apparent motive was a Thai police officer whose fiancee and daughter were on board and apparently killed for the insurance payout.  The thinking at the time was that the bomb was meant to explode over the South China Sea to cover it up.  But the police was later found not guilty for lack of evidence.  

Here is Wikipedia's short entry on this incident. 

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathay_Pacific_Flight_700Z.

Best,

Carl 

  

[Bruce Palling]

I was based in Bangkok a couple of years later and still recall the contempt the Cathay GM held for the Thai Government. Apparently the thinking amongst the legal authorities was that it was too shaming for Thailand to admit that such an atrocity could ever be committed by a Thai national, therefore, it never happened…

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[Matt Franjola]

I was in Pleiku when Cathay flight crashed. Drove down with Ken Wagner. We were both with UPI covering offensive in Kontum and elsewhere in highlands.No AP reporters were on scene. Plane went down in Montagnard area between Pleiku and Ban me Thuot. Was a lonely drive on dirt path. US spec forces first on scene with gas masks. quite bad smell.

Lot of Japanese pax strapped in seats and squashed to about 2 ft high. One US family from Midwest all killed.

Later I believe the Thai police LT. tried but acquitted and afterwards somebody killed him.

matt

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