https://archive.triblive.com/news/world/30-years-later-bombing-of-pan-am-flight-over-lockerbie-scotland-remains-under-investigation/
30 years later: Bombing of Pan Am Flight over Lockerbie, Scotland, remains under investigation
A woman reaches out to touch the main memorial stone in memory of the victims of the bombing of Pan Am flight 103, in the garden of remembrance near Lockerbie, Scotland Friday Dec. 21, 2018. On Dec. 21, 1988, 270 people were killed when a terrorist bomb exploded aboard the Pan Am flight Boeing 747 over Lockerbie, Scotland, sending wreckage crashing to the ground.
Three decades after a terrorist bomb brought down Pan AM Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, on Dec. 21, 1988, killing 270 people, a joint investigation spanning the Atlantic continues to seek Libyan conspirators involved in the plot.
A new FBI documentary revisits one of its longest-running investigations — a joint effort by investigators here and in Scotland — through the stories of those closest to the tragedy. That includes Glenn and Carole Johnson, the Hempfield couple who spent years lobbying for improved air security after their daughter Beth Ann died in the bombing.
Beth Ann Johnson, 21, then a student at Seton Hill University in Greensburg, and classmate Elyse Saraceni, 20, were returning from a semester in England when a bomb hidden in a cassette recorder exploded in Flight 103’s cargo hold. The explosion killed all 259 passengers and crew members as well as 11 people on the ground in Lockerbie.
Army Maj. Charles McKee, 40, of Trafford, and University of Pittsburgh professor David J. Gould, 45, of Squirrel Hill, also died in the bombing that investigators consider the first terrorist attack on America.
Eventually, the investigation led to the arrest and 2001 conviction of Libyan intelligence officer Abdelbaset Al-Megrahi. Al-Megrahi died in 2009, three years after he was released from a Scottish prison on compassionate grounds while suffering from cancer.
Nine years later, authorities continue to pursue co-conspirators in the plot.
Like their counterparts in the FBI, Scottish investigators remain committed to the case.
“We know, for example, there are people alive in Libya who played a part in the conspiracy to kill,” Stuart Cossar, detective inspector of Police Scotland, said of the joint investigation. “This is a very much alive investigation, and we hope at some point in the future we will have another trial, another conviction.”
Deb Erdley is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Deb at 724-850-1209, derdley@tribweb.com or via Twitter @deberdley_trib.
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