Gone

“KAL 007”
Written by Michael Pyndus

RICHARD: Listener discretion is advised. This episode includes discussions of

murder, dismemberment, and the desecration of corpses. Some people
may find the material offensive. Listener discretion is strongly suggested
children under 13.

COLD OPEN

(SFX: SEAT BELTS CLICKING, FLIGHT BELL DINGING, RADIO CHATTER)

MOLLY: The warning bell goes off - You strap into your seat!

They say it’s nothing to worry about, just “mild turbulence.” Yet you can’t
shake that feeling…. That realization that the only thing keeping you up in
the air is a metallic tube with four engines…

RICHARD: Millions of people all across the world suffer from aviophobia, or the fear
of flying. Sure the statistics say you have a one in eleven million chance of
crashing in a plane, and with that a 95.7% chance of surviving that crash.

But what happens when the plane crashes because of… unnatural
causes…

(FX: PLANE GOING DOWN)

MOLLY: As far back as the Wright brothers, planes have crashed for seemingly
mysterious reasons. While some mysteries are eventually solved, others
remain lost to time.

RICHARD: And no, we’re not talking about the Bermuda Triangle! Today we’re
going to talk about a real life horror scenario. One that ended tragically for
some 269 passengers, and almost put the world on course for World War
III. Today we’re looking at the mysterious fate of Korean Airlines Flight
0-0-7.

(THEME MUSIC)

RICHARD: Hi! I’m RICHARD.

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MOLLY: And I’m MOLLY. Welcome to “Gone,” the show where we search for
everything missing.

RICHARD: Each week, we examine mysterious disappearances and the theories they
spawned. From the Amber Room to Amelia Earhart, Picasso paintings to
the Etruscan language, the Roanoke Colony to the lost Russian
cosmonauts.

MOLLY: If it disappeared, we’re looking for it.

RICHARD: If you want to listen to more episodes, you can find them on your favorite
podcast directory, or on our website Parcast.com. And don’t forget to
check out our other awesome shows too.

MOLLY: With that in mind, let’s dig into this week’s episode of GONE.

(TRANSITIONAL MUSIC)

RICHARD: For this week, we’ll look into the tragic flight of Korean Airline Flight 0-
0-7, also known as KAL 007.

MOLLY: KAL was a Boeing 747 commercial airliner transporting some 269 crew
and passengers from New York to Seoul, South Korea. On August 30,
1983, the plane stopped at Anchorage, Alaska before continuing on their
way. As the plane made its way to Seoul, it deviated from its usual course
and entered Soviet Airspace.

RICHARD: Within a few hours of its flight, KAL went missing; Its last transmission -
a veritable S-O-S.

MOLLY: By September 1, 1983, Korea, the US, and even Japan, tripped over
themselves to try and find out what happened. And at the center of the
search were the Soviets, feigning ignorance over the source of the tragedy.

RICHARD: America, and the rest of the world, were in an uproar. At this point the
disappearance of KAL 007 had been the worst airline disaster in the
history of aviation, yet no one knew what happened - People wanted
answers!

MOLLY: It wouldn’t be until 1993, ten years later, that some kind of closure would
be provided, but for the victims’ families, it still wouldn’t be enough.

RICHARD: Which begs the question: What did happen to flight KAL 007 and its 269
occupants?

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MOLLY: That’s what we hope to find out today. First we’ll go into the facts of what
we know happened to KAL 007, then we’ll talk about some of the popular
theories pushed around at the time including being shot down, government
spy missions, soviet captives, and even a US cover-up!

RICHARD: So without further ado, let’s delve into the mystery of KAL 007.

ACT I: TAKE OFF

(MUSIC: TRANSITION – TENSE)

MOLLY: 1983 was a momentous year for many reasons: the US congress released a
report condemning Japanese Internment camps during WWII, and famed
nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie was arrested in Bolivia.

RICHARD: In pop culture - Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” became number one on the
billboards for 37 weeks, the final episode of MASH aired, and E.T. won
best picture in the 40th golden globes.

MOLLY: And 1983 was also marked by ever increasing Soviet and US tension.

RICHARD: The Soviets were working hard on nuclear tests underground, and
President Reagan had cleared the STAR WARS PROGRAM. This was a
new defense system designed to counter nuclear attacks with satellite
guided weapons such as lasers.

MOLLY: The Soviets were also hard at work on their own defense and detection
system called RYAN. This early warning system was designed to warn
against preemptive nuclear strikes by America.

RICHARD: In response, Reagan continued to amass American forces with joint

exercises like FleetEx 83-1- the largest Naval Exercise held to date in the
North Pacific with over forty ships and three-hundred aircrafts.

MOLLY: Suffice to say, things were very… VERY… tense

RICHARD: And things were only going to grow worse.

(SFX: SWITCHES CLICKED, AIRPLANE ENGINES THROTTLING)

MOLLY: On August 30, 1983, Korean Airline Flight 007 departed from New York
for Seoul.

RICHARD: KAL 007 was an impressive Boeing jumbo jet. Formerly a leisure airline
operated out of Frankfurt Germany, it was later purchased by Korean
Airlines for commercial travel.

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MOLLY: On this day KAL 007 was nearly maxed to its capacity. It had 246
passengers including sixty-three American passengers, one of whom was
US. Congressman Larry McDonald, a staunch anti-communist and
democratic representative for Georgia.

RICHARD: McDonald was on his way with other American representatives to Seoul
for the Anniversary of the South Korea Mutual Defense Treaty.

MOLLY: What was also interesting about this flight was its large number of crew.
KAL had about 23 crewmembers aboard. Even with the 246 passengers
this was still a high ratio for crewmembers.

RICHARD: It’s believed that at least six members of the expanded crew were
deadheading crew. Deadheading crew are air attendants not technically
working. Usually they are simply on board to get to their next assignment.

MOLLY: The plane was operated by Captain Chun Byung-in, his first officer Son
Dong-hui, and flight engineer Kim Eui-dong. Their goal was to get
everyone to Gimpo International Airport in Seoul, South Korea.

RICHARD: Also among these passengers was twenty-three-year –old American

student, Alice Ephramison-Abt.

MOLLY: Alice was bright young girl, on her way to teach English while studying
abroad in China. This was just one stop on her way. Her father, Hans, had
been particularly worried, but Alice told him not to worry. Everything
would be okay.

RICHARD: The plane was already thirty-five minutes behind on its departure time,
and had to make a stop at Anchorage International Airport in Alaska for
refueling.

MOLLY: At this point in time, the plane’s autopilot system would have been
updated to the new route.

RICHARD: At the time, the Boeing’s autopilot system was comprised of four modes:
HEADING, VOR/LOC, ILS and INS.

MOLLY: Heading deals with the direction the nose of the plane is facing. In this
case, the heading function deals with the maintained magnetic course of
the plane. It is selected by the pilot.

RICHARD: VOR stands for ‘very high frequency omni-directional radio range’. But to
break it down further, this mode allows the plan to know what direction

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 its going in by tracking radio signals. These signals are sent from beacons
on the ground called localizers.

This is important as these help maintain where the plane is going by

hitting designated checkmarks along its route.

MOLLY: Another important instrument is the ILS. This tracks both vertical and
lateral course beacons for the plane. Basically this is how the plane tracks
the specific runway it needs to land on.

RICHARD: Finally there’s INS - the inertial navigation system. This maintains the
plane’s selected course by tracking various waypoints put into the plane’s
computer. This system is very important, as once the INS is programmed
into the computer, the pilot can turn on autopilot mode and the plane will
automatically track its own course.

MOLLY: Think of INS as the guard rails on bowling lane. They keep the plane on
course.

RICHARD: There is one caveat however. If the plane goes more than seven-and-a-half
miles off course the tracking system will shut off. However an alarm
usually sounds if the plane starts to go off course - so long as the correct
course is put into the computer.

MOLLY: In a nutshell, all of this is to help keep the plane going in the direction it’s
supposed to go.

RICHARD: You might be wondering why all of these technical terms are important?
As we delve into the mystery of what happened to KAL 007, we’ll look
into whether or not the plane disappeared over technical issues, or human
issues as well.

MOLLY: But let’s not bog the audience down too much. Let’s get back to what
happened to KAL 007.

(SFX: PLAN TAKING OFF)

RICHARD: After a brief layover in Anchorage to refuel, KAL 007 was ready to take
off again.

MOLLY: The plane departed Anchorage at 13:00 UTC or coordinated universal

time. This is the standard for tracking planes’ flight time across the global.

RICHARD: Air traffic control told KAL 007 to head directly to Bethel, Alaska. From
there, the plane was instructed to enter the northernmost of five 50 mile

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 wide airways known as the North Pacific routes. These were the airways
that bridged Alaska and Japan.

MOLLY: KAL 007 was directed to take the route known Romero two zero.

MOLLY: Romeo Two Zero skirted Soviet airspace, specifically the coast of the
Kamchatka Peninsula, by about twenty miles.

RICHARD: And while tensions were high, this twenty mile space between airways
was still deemed safe. Also, so long as a plane’s navigation systems such
as VOR/LOC, INS, and HEADING were working, the flight crew and
pilot could maintain a safe flight.

MOLLY: Keep in mind too, that many of the plane’s internal navigation systems
depended on the vectors given to it by air traffic control. So if any data is
given incorrectly to the plane, it’s course could be seriously altered.

RICHARD: And at the time of takeoff from Anchorage, there was a bit of a problem.

(SFX: RADAR PINGS)

MOLLY: Unfortunately, Anchorage’s airport, VOR beacon which helps the plane
track its course, was not operational. It had been shut down for
maintenance. This meant that KAL 007 received a ‘notice to airmen’
regarding their course.

RICAHRD: A notice to airmen is a notice filed with an aviation authority to warn

pilots of any problems or potential dangers during their flight route.

MOLLY: Despite the downed VOR Beacon, this wasn’t deemed too much of a
problem for KAL 007. All KAL 007 had to do was pass over Bethel, and
Bethel’s beacon would send the necessary course instructions. Once the
plane did that, the crew could switch the plane over to the autopilot
functions, like INS and VOR.

RICHARD: It’s important to note that the INS mode was necessary for this route, as
Romeo two zero was out of range from most VOR stations. Yet this route
saved time when it came to air travel. The caveat being that everything
had to be calculated correctly.

RICHARD: So if anything was miscalculated, or off kilter, KAL 007 could go off
course.

MOLLY: And there would be little help to offer them.

(MUSIC: INTENSIFIES)

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RICHARD: Sure enough, only after 10 minutes from departing, KAL 007’s heading
was 245 degrees, not 220. They were off by 25 degrees. That’s nearly
three times the limit of the seven-and-a-half-mile course correction
function in the autopilot computer. This means that if the plane was put
into autopilot while already off course, the plane would simply continue
flying in the wrong direction.

MOLLY: What’s even more horrifying is that it seemed no one noticed! Not the
pilot, the crew, not even air traffic control. So for the next five and a half
hours, KAL 007 continued to deviate from its course…

RICHARD: And what happened next was unthinkable…

ACT II: SHOOT DOWN

(SFX: PLANE ENGINES ROARING)

MOLLY: Within twenty-eight minutes of take-off, civilian radar at Kenai Peninsula

on the eastern shore of Cook Inlet in the Gulf of Alaska, tracked KAL 007
north of where it was supposed to be. This meant the plane was off to the
right of its designated course.

RICHARD: Fifty minutes later, military radar at King Salmon, Alaska also tracked the
plane north of its supposed course.

MOLLY: Keep in mind that while these stations tracked the plane, neither knew that
the plane was off course, nor was it their jobs to track the planes.

RICAHRD: That’s right. All they knew was that there was a commercial airliner flying
through their radar. A common occurrence given the north pacific routes.
And so long as the plane wasn’t flying erratically...

MOLLY: No one was suspicious.

RICHARD: Exactly.

MOLLY: Pretty soon the plane had deviated six times beyond its supposed course;
leaving it more than 2 nautical miles past the point of expected course
deviation. In other words, the plane was well beyond its route, more
running alongside Romeo Two Zero than actually being on it.

RICAHRD: This divergence would have prevented the plane from transmitting its
position via short range very high frequency radio as it would be far out of
range of the necessary beacons along Romeo Two Zero

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MOLLY: To check in with their position then, KAL 007 transmitted to another
plane that was in the air, KAL 015.

RICHARD: Like KAL 007, KAL 015 was on its way to Seoul, South Korea and was
carrying other American representatives for the treaty anniversary,
including Idaho Senator Steve Symms, North Carolina Senator Jess
Helms, and Senator Carroll Hubbard of Kentucky.

MOLLY: KAL 015 was only fifteen minutes behind KAL 007 in flight time. So
KAL 007’s flight crew requested KAL 015 relay its position. This was to
help confirm that KAL 007 was somewhere on the right course.

RICHARD: At 14:43 UTC, an hour and forty minutes into their flight, KAL 007
relayed a change in its arrival time, its next waypoint along Romeo two
zero.

MOLLY: KAL 007 did this using high frequency radio rather than the standard very
high frequencies.

RICHARD: The reason behind this, is that high frequencies can travel longer
distances. The problem is that these frequencies are also more vulnerable
to electromagnetic interference. As we’ll see in the in the final moments of
KAL 007.

MOLLY: My question is if they were able to transmit any kind of message, why
didn’t anyone ask about their course deviation?

RICAHRD: An excellent question, Molly. Sadly, the answer is rather is rather tragic…
But more on that later.

MOLLY: KAL 007 continued to deviate from Romeo Two Zero’s course. By now
they were more than 60 miles off course. At around half way through to
the second waypoint marker, the plane entered into the NAADC buffer
zone, which is the North American Aerospace Defense Command zone.
This area might be more familiar by its later name, NORAD.

RICHARD: It think it’s pretty safe to assume this area was off limits to civilians.

MOLLY: Exactly. And now KAL 007 had just passed into the southernmost tip.
This also meant they had passed into the international dateline, changing
the date from August 31, to September 1.

RICHARD: The international dateline marks the change in time across the world, and
runs roughly along 180 degree longitude. This means the plane had
jumped forward in time.

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MOLLY: While not necessarily a problem for the plane is does complicate things
when trying to solve what happened to the plane.

RICHARD: At around 18:26 UTC, five-and-a-half-hours into their trip, KAL 007
requested clearance from Tokyo Air Traffic Control to ascend to around
35,0000 feet near Sakhalin Island in Soviet airspace. They hoped to
preserve fuel.

MOLLY: Keep in mind at this point it is still unclear if they knew they were off
course, or if they can any idea where they were at all.

(SFX: EXPLOSION, PLANE SCREAMING, NOSE DIVING)

(MUSIC: INTENSE/ ALMOST LIKE A JUMP SCARE)

MOLLY: Suddenly the plane shot upward , ascending higher, and higher. The pilots
were scrambling! Meanwhile passengers were panicking, everything had
suddenly just lurched straight up. You can only imagine what was running
through people’s minds. Were they about to crash?!

RICHARD: The pilots tried reaching back out to Tokyo Air Traffic Control, but radio
transmissions were limited by high frequency signals. KAL 007 was on its
own!

(SFX: PLANE CAREENING THROUGH THE AIR)

(SILENCE)

(SFX: RADIO CHATTER WITH NO RESPONSE)

MOLLY: What had happened? KAL 007’s last transmission was garbled in static.
Tokyo tried reaching out using HR frequencies but to no avail.

RICHARD: Tokyo tried reaching out to KAL 015. KAL 015 also couldn’t get an
answer. Something had gone very… VERY… wrong.

MOLLY: So as of September 1, 1983, KAL 007 was declared missing, and

presumably crashed.

RICHARD: Word quickly spread like wild fire. The US quickly latched onto the story,
feverishly alerting all available resources for any available information;
where had the plane crashed, what had happened, and who was
responsible…?

MOLLY: At the same time, Hans Ephramison-Abt, the father of beautiful Alice, was
drowning in tension. What had happened to his little girl?

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 (AD BREAK)

ACT III: SEARCH & RESCUE

(FADE UP MUSIC: FRANTIC, SIMILAR TO THIS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGPNshypY9)

MOLLY: Literally within minutes of KAL 007’s disappearance, the US, South
Korea, and Japan scrambled to get search and rescue operations underway.
Both military and civilian ships were called in for immediate “Search and
Rescue.”

RICHARD: Still everyone couldn’t help but wonder how this had happened, and who
was responsible. It didn’t take long for the first theory to spring up… KAL
007 was shot down by the Soviets.

MOLLY: Soon, US and Japanese officials to picked up on the fact that KAL 007
had been traveling off course. But what really got them concerned was
that it looked like the plane had been skirting the NAADC buffer zone and
entering Soviet airspace before its disappearance.

RICHARD: And while there was no hard evidence to the fact the soviets shot down the
plane, South Korea felt so convinced that they designated the US and
Japan as the primary search agents. As owners of the plane, Korea could
designate whomever they wanted to search for the plane, and if the USSR
was involved and attempted to salvage the aircraft, the US and Japan were
entitled to use force to stop them.

MOLLY: Of course, things quickly got complicated when the USSR actually
showed up to join the search…

(SFX: BOAT ENGINES ROARING, WATER SPLASHING, RUSSIAN CHATTER)

RICHARD: Since it was believed the plane crashed somewhere off the coast of
Moneron Island, the Soviets also felt inclined to “assist”. However, they
opted to search more on their own.

MOLLY: And their involvement in the search only intensified cold war tensions.

RICHARD: The Soviets were incredibly hostile - stonewalling any marine rescue
vessels from entering their sovereign waters. They also barged onto
civilian ships, threatening crew members and confiscating property. More
than once, standoffs were held between US and Soviet ships over who
would get to search where.

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MOLLY: What proved extra damning on the international stage for Soviets was
their secrecy. They refused to share or cooperate with any of the search
efforts, and reconnaissance from other vessels suggested the Soviets were
searching in other areas beyond the designated search zones…

RICHARD: Sounds like the Russians definitely knew more than they were letting on.

MOLLY: Absolutely, but the biggest shock came just five days after the crash of
KAL 007.

(SFX: CAMERA FLASHES, EXCITED VOICES)

RICHARD: On September 6, 1983, The Soviets held a press conference revealing to

the world that they were, in fact, responsible for crashing KAL 007.

MOLLY: While the Soviets refused to give any concrete details they claimed to
have shot down the plane - claiming it was a spy vessel.

They then condemned the US for its reconnaissance missions over Soviet
territory. They cited the US’ hawkish attitude towards the East as the
reason for this tragedy.

RICHARD: The US and South Korea were furious beyond words. President Reagan
called the shooting down of KAL 007 a “massacre,” and blamed the
Soviet’s incompetence for the death of 269 innocents.

MOLLY: For Hans, and the other families, they were furious beyond compare. How
could a country shoot down a civilian aircraft so coldly. It was bad enough
to think Alice was lost at sea, but now it looked as though she had been
murdered for no reason at all.

RICHARD: The rest of the world wanted to know too how Russians confused a
commercial airliner for a spy plane? Or did they deliberately shoot down a
civilian aircraft? But until they could find the wreckage of the plane...

(MUSIC TRANSITION: LESS INTENSE, MORE METHODICAL; PRECISE)

MOLLY: With the reveal that the Russians had shot down the plane, the
investigation of KAL 007 was turned over to the International Civil
Aviation Organization, or ICAO.

RICHARD: This proved to be a rather controversial move, as the ICAO had only one
investigation prior to KAL 007, with the crash of Libyan Arab Airlines
Flight 114 in February of 1973. But what really added to the controversy,
was the fact that the switching of the investigation from the National
Transportation Safety Board to ICAO meant that the Reagan

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 Administration was effectively precluded from revealing any sensitive
military information pertaining to the US’ involvement in using spy planes
to do recon over Russia.

MOLLY: You see, the ICAO lacked the authority to subpoena persons or
governments without their voluntary cooperation. That means unless the
USSR, or the US for that matter, voluntarily gave up documents pertaining
to the crash, ICAO had to rely on other sources for their investigation.

RICHARD: To many this raised more alarms. Why would the Reagan administration
do this? Some felt it was an illegal move. Others felt this was done to hide
any embarrassment of the administration in the event that any fault on the
US’ part could be concealed.

MOLLY: Other reports suggested that this might have had to do with propaganda at
the time - keeping the narrative centered on the Russians being an “evil
empire”, while at the same time limiting information about the US’ covert
reconnaissance missions.

Sounds like everyone was trying to cover their butts.

RICHARD: It’s definitely strange that the US would turn over the investigation to an
authoritative body that had little power, especially given the magnitude of
the situation.

It very well could be the US was hiding something, which only raised
further questions. Was it about their own fault in tracking KAL 007, or did
it have to do with the spy missions they were running out of Alaska?

MOLLY: But while people began to question the motives of the US’ investigation, a
major breakthrough happened.

(SFX: WAVES WASHING ON THE BEACH)

RICHARD: By September 9, 1983 the first sign of the passengers’ fate arrived. Human
remains washed ashore the north side of Hokkaido, Japan – thirty miles
from Sakhalin where the plane was last detected, and thirty-five miles
from its supposed crash site near Moneron Island.

MOLLY: Thirteen body parts in total were found, most unidentifiable. The ICAO
concluded that these remains were carried by currents from Soviet waters
across the Soya Strait.

RICHARD: Soon more objects began to wash ashore: shoes, seats, newspapers, paper
cups, even a pair a of dentures.

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MOLLY: Interestingly enough, all these items came from the passenger cabin,
suggesting perhaps the cabin had been punctured or destroyed. Either way
it did not bode well for finding any survivors.

RICHARD: That same day, Rear Admiral William A. Cockhell assumed command of
the search and rescue effort for the joint American – Japanese search.
Furthermore, the mission was reclassified from a search and rescue, to a
search and salvage operation.

MOLLY: If it hadn’t been official before, it was now. It looked as though there were
no survivors. Hans was devastated. Together with the families of those
lost, the world mourned for the victims of KAL 007. Victims of a
seemingly pointless murder.

RICHARD: Yet even while grieving, Hans wanted answers. The world wanted
answers.

MOLLY: For the next month, underwater operations were conducted, searching a
sixty-square-mile area in both international and Soviet territory - much to
the Soviets’ chagrin as they didn’t want anyone trespassing in their
territory.

RICHARD: Once again the Soviets continued to hamper any progress by the US and
Japanese search parties.

MOLLY: Not only did they continue to block and board vessels, they tampered with
US sonars, attempted to ram rigs, and even placed false pingers to mislead
search parties. This and more was reported in the ICAO’s first report to
the UN on September 15, 1983.

RICHARD: On September 26, 1983, the acting KGB General A.I. Romanenko,
commander of the frontier guard, met with seven delegates from the US
and Japan. He handed over surface findings the Soviets had found thus far.
These included mostly articles of clothing such as footwear and shirts.

MOLLY: Many still believed the Russians were hiding something. Based on reports,
the Russians were keeping a tight radius around a 60 mile search area
around international and Soviet waters

RICHARD: About a month later, the US and Japan search was expanded to a 225 mile
area reaching the western part of Sakhalin Island. The goal was to find any
sign of wreckage from the plane, anything that could lead to answers.
Sadly this search was also unsuccessful.

MOLLY: Around this time the head of the ICAO, Caj Frostell, tried to get the
Russians to turn over any and all data regarding KAL 007’s shootdown.

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 These included fight recorders, transcripts, ATC tapes – anything and
everything they had found.

You can imagine what the Russians said.

RICHARD: No?

MOLLY: Yup. They absolutely refused, and what’s worse, the ICAO couldn’t do
anything about it.

More and more it looked like the Soviets held all the cards, and they
weren’t going to reveal their hand.

RICHARD: Was there nothing the US could offer in terms of information?

MOLLY: Funny you should mention that –

In the event of an aviation disaster any radar tracking dealing with the
incident are usually impounded. Yet in this case, all radar data from
Anchorage were recycled within twenty-four to thirty hours.

RICHARD: But KAL 007 went down about five hours after it left Anchorage. That
means theoretically the data should have been immediately saved.

MOLLY: You’re not wrong.

RICHARD: So what happened?

MOLLY: Many suspect the tapes were destroyed to conceal something; the question
was what? Again, people began to point back towards the US’ spy
missions, or the fact that they knew the plane was off course early on and
did nothing about it. But more on those theories later.

(SFX: GAVIL SLAMMING DOWN, COURT ROOM CHATTER)

RICHARD: By the end of October, the operations to find the wreckage of KAL 007
had concluded. Then on December 2, 1983 the ICAO released its official
report.

MOLLY: They concluded that KAL 007 had unintentionally violated Soviet
Airspace which was highly illegal, and was shot down somewhere off
Moneron Island.This error in navigation was probably caused by a failure
to select a correct INS mode and for being too far off course to correct it.

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RICHARD: Based on simulations run by Boeing and Litton, the ICAO concluded that
the crew either did not notice this error, or failed to perform necessary
navigational checks.

MOLLY: It was a rather dissatisfying ending. Many criticized the ICAO for not
being harder on the Soviets. The families of the victims felt nothing had
actually been resolved, as they still had no idea what happened to their
loved ones.

RICHARD: In response to this, Hans, and the families affected, created The American
Association for Families of KAL 007. For the next ten years, this group
lobbied congress and airliners for better disclosures regarding airline
disasters and better compensation for victims’ families.

MOLLY: The families also went into a long litigation with Korean Airlines for what
happened. Yet this proved an uphill battle, as without evidence of “pain
and suffering” the airliners would only compensate families with the bare
minimum.

RICHARD: This would become part of long battle fought by Hans and the association.

MOLLY: Still there were some improvements brought about despite the horrendous
tragedy. The FAA closed route Romeo Two Zero temporarily for about a
month until flight safety could be verified. It also established a new radar
system on Saint Paul Island in the Bering Sea.

RICHARD: Plane’s autopilot systems were modified to make it more obvious which
system a plane was operating under, and the US decided to extend air
traffic coverage with military radar to help track planes better.

MOLLY: President Reagan also announced the release of GPS, or Global

Positioning Systems, to the public, free of charge. Though at the same
time, NATO also approved the US to deploy cruise missiles in West
Germany. Which the Soviet didn’t take too kindly too.

RICAHRD: Yet despite the tension, compromises were also made. In 1986, the US,
Japan, and USSR, set up a joint air traffic control system to monitor
aircraft over the north pacific. They also set up direct communication
between the three countries in the event of further air confusion.

MOLLY: But even with all that, answers were still sought after. And when no one
could offer anything satisfying, people began to come up with their own
theories as to what happened to KAL 007…

ACT IV: THEORIES MOUNT

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MOLLY: Despite the 1983 report from ICAO, many felt that there were more
questions than answers.

RICHARD: To make matters worse, Russia did little to pay for its destruction of KAL
007. This lead others to believe that perhaps even the US government may
have had a hand in the crash of KAL 007.

MOLLY: For the next ten years, theories regarding what happened to KAL 007 and
its occupants circulated and evolved; ranging from simple crew failure,
US spies, and even Soviet prison camps.

RICHARD: Let’s start by examining the ICAO’s 1983 report.

MOLLY: As mentioned earlier, the ICAO suspected that the flight crew lacked
situational awareness.

RICHARD: In layman’s terms, they had no idea they were off course.

But how could that really be? Didn’t they have all that equipment to
correct them like the INS function of their plane?

MOLLY: Yes, it is very suspicious. But here’s the catch. This theory of situational
ignorance may not be too far-fetched. If, when programed, the INS is off
by even ten degrees, it can throw off the entire navigation system.

That means even the course correction of seven-point-five miles wouldn’t

even work.

RICHARD: Fair. But again, I have to wonder why the crew, or even ATC, couldn’t
have checked to make sure everything was on the level.

MOLLY: Again, to the pilots everything may have seemed correct, because the
incorrect data was read as the true heading.

RICHARD: So you’re saying they were given the wrong readouts, and were none the
wiser.

MOLLY: Exactly. It’s possible that while the plane was in the ramp position while
waiting for take-off from Anchorage, that the flight engineer input the
incorrect longitude.

RICHARD: I’m surprised that that wouldn’t have been noticed by the computers.

MOLLY: Here’s why: you only need the latitude to be correct for all three platforms
of the autopilot function.

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RICHARD: So as long as latitude is correct…

MOLLY: The computers would have read everything as okay, even with the wrong
longitude.

RICHARD: What if everything was put in correctly?

MOLLY: Had everything been put in correctly, then the horizontal indicator would
have altered the pilots to any form of course alteration.

RICHARD: Another point of fact is that the weather radar would have alerted them to
their strange flight path.

MOLLY: The weather radar has two modes – Ground Mapping and Weather
Surveillance.

Ground mapping would have been key, because it would have let them
know if they had flown over land or not. So if KAL 007 did fly over
Kamchatka, or the Sakhalin Island, the flight crew would have notice this.

That being said, if the plane was in weather surveillance mode, that only
measures cloud coverage and thunderstorm detection. So they wouldn’t
have been able to detect terrain beneath them.

RICHARD: But if something was wrong, surely someone would have spoken up
though right?

MOLLY: One thing to note is that at the time, airplane culture was that, if the
captain said everything was okay - it was okay.

Crewmembers weren’t necessarily allowed to question the captain, even if

they knew he was wrong.

RICHARD: All very valid points, but what if the deviation was intentional?

One theory argued by David Pearson in his 1991 book “KAL 007: The
Cover-Up” is that the pilot knew what was going on, and that the deviation
was actually planned all along. Given the amount of data the crew had at
their disposal, it seemed almost impossible for them not to know
something was wrong.

MOLLY: But why intentionally go into Soviet airspace at the height of Cold War
tension?

RICHARD: Remember how the US was running reconnaissance missions in and out of
Soviet airspace from Alaska to the USSR.

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MOLLY: Yes.

RICHARD: Well another popular theory among conspiracy theorists regarding KAL
007, is that the plane was actually on a reconnaissance mission, testing to
see how Soviets would respond.

MOLLY: Okay, so what supports this theory?

RICHARD: We already mentioned all the various instruments used to make sure the
plane was on course, many also point out the incongruence of a civilian
plane “accidentally entering” Soviet airspace, despite the wide array of
radars and telecommunication methods to alert them.

For instance, did you know the US had multiple radar systems active in
the area? These were called COBRA JUDY, COBRA DANE, COBRA
TALON. If the plane was entering Soviet airspace, these radars should
have detected this, and alerted them. Yet nothing was done.

MOLLY: Very interesting.

RICHARD: This might also back up another theory proposed by French writer Michel
Brun in 1991. He suggested that KAL 007 was a decoy, to distract the
Russians while the US continued its planned aerial spy missions.
Unfortunately KAL was spotted and shot down, which he suggests lead to
an actual dog fight between Russian and American forces.

To back this claim up, Brun points to a picture taken during part of the
salvage operation, that shows the hull of a missile with the letter “N”
painted on the side. He cites that the letter N does not exist in the Russian
alphabet.

MOLLY: I don’t know how I feel about this theory. I feel given cold war tension if a
massive aerial shoot-out between US and Soviet planes had broken out,
we’d all be recovering from World War Three. But the idea of the US’
involvement still holds a few interesting notes.

RICHARD: Such as?

MOLLY: One, the switching of the investigation to the ICAO instead of the NTBS.
This was highly controversial and even illegal, as the NTBS had more
jurisdiction. Many wanted to know why they wanted to switch?

RICHARD: And this theory suggests it was to cover up the US’ involvement
somehow?

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MOLLY: Yup. This would also explain why the air traffic control tapes were
destroyed so quickly despite them being needed for the investigation.
My guess is, that the US wanted to cover up any involvement with
the reconnaissance missions they were doing, which would have violated
Soviet-American relations.

RICHARD: That I can put more credence into.

Something else that bothers me is the lack of bodies found. Where had
everyone gone? After all, the only physical evidence that was found were
13 mangled body parts that couldn’t be identified, along various luggage
and clothes.

MOLLY: One of the more gruesome theories is that the bodies were eaten by the
Japanese crab spider, which are large crabs that feed near the bottom of
the oceans, or by other sea life. This theory has been tossed out the
window though, as crab spiders don’t eat bones.

RICHARD: To me, the best theory is the decompression theory. We know that the
various clothing items found came from the passenger cabins. It’s possible
that when KAL 007 was shot down, the hull was breached causing a
vacuum effect that sucked everyone out. Scattering them across the sea.

MOLLY: As morbid as it sounds, I think that’s probably the most plausible scenario,
or at least something very similar to that occurred. Though there is one
more theory, however, that’s quite possibly the scariest.

RICHARD: What’s that?

MOLLY: That the Russians not only recovered the plane, but found the crew and
passengers as well. One theory even suggest that the crew and passengers
were alive and imprisoned for life.

RICHARD: That is terrifying.

MOLLY: Indeed. We know the Russians shot down the aircraft and were very
clandestine in their recovery operations. One of the more popular theories
is that the Russians knew exactly where KAL had crashed and went in
ahead of everyone else.

Then, using trawlers and divers, gathered the bodies and covered up any
evidence as best they could.

RICHARD: Pretty horrid if you ask me.

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MOLLY: It doesn’t stop there. One extreme theory pushed by former Soviet prison
camp inmate, Avraham Shifrin, and writer, Bert Scholssberg, suggested
that the plane crash landed, but its occupants survived. The Russians got to
them first though, and placed them in prison camps for the remainder of
their lives.

RICHARD: Talk about a nightmare scenario.

MOLLY: Thankfully there’s no real evidence to support the prison camp theory.

RICHARD: Regardless of what you believed at the time during the 1980s, everyone
wanted answers, and it seemed none would ever be made available. That is
until 1993…

(AD BREAK)

ACT V: REVELATIONS

(MUSIC FADE UP)

RICHARD: It had been ten years since the tragic loss of 269 people on KAL 007. In
that decade, numerous theories and conspiracies were hatched explaining
what really happened.

MOLLY: All anyone knew for sure was that the Russians had shot down the plane.
But other than that, little was truly known about why the plane was in
soviet territory, or where the plane crashed for that matter. It seemed the
families of all those lost lives would never truly find peace. That is until
December 25, 1991.

(SFX: PEOPLE CHEERING)

RICHARD: On that fateful Christmas, the Sickle and Hammer came down over the
Kremlin, and the new Russian Bars rose above. It was the end of the
Soviet Union.

MOLLY: With the collapse of the USSR, people once again grew hopefully that
answers would finally be revealed as to what happened to KAL 007.

RICHARD: And out of those people, Hans Ephramison-Abt, took the initiative.

MOLLY: That same December, Hans wrote to Senator Jesse Helms of the
Committee of Foreign Relations. Senator Helms was on the sister flight of
KAL 015, and almost flew on KAL 007.

20
RICHARD: Hans implored Helms to write to Russia, and try once again to get
answers. Helms agreed, and wrote Russian President, Boris Yeltsin. He
requested information concerning the survival of the passengers and crew
along with the fate of Congressman McDonald.

MOLLY: The new President of the Russian Federation agreed to look into it. By
June 17, 1992, President Yeltsin revealed he had found five memos
regarding the fate of KAL 007, along with the plane’s flight recorder, CTC
tapes, and more.

RICHARD: The memos went on to describe how KAL 007 had crashed off Moneron
Island after being shot down by Soviet fighter pilots. The wreckage was
later found on October 20, 1983 – fifty days after its crash.

MOLLY: Further scrutiny of the memos also revealed that the USSR had not only
lied about finding the plane, but finding the recorders and black box.
Despite their claims of the plane being a spy, they knew they had shot
down a civilian plane, and instead opted to conceal the obvious truth.
Hoping to cover up their astronomical mistake.

RICHARD: It was everything the families could have wanted and more.

MOLLY: By September 11, 1992, Yeltsin promised to hand the tapes over to the
South Korean government along with a transcript of the flight recorders
from declassified KGB files.

RICHARD: Shortly thereafter, the families of the KAL 007 lead by Hans Ephramison-
Abt, along with US State Department officials, were invited to Moscow by
Yeltsin for a formal apology and to receive additional copies of the data
recovered.

MOLLY: By January of 1993, the ICAO voted to reopen the case with the new
findings. At long last people were going to find out what really happened.

RICHARD: So what did happen to KAL 007 and what did the Russians find?

(SFX: RADAR PINGS)

MOLLY: At 15:51 UTC, KAL 007 entered restricted airspace over the Kamchatka
Peninsula. This had been designated prohibited airspace by the Soviets at
the time.

RICHARD: In response to the unidentified aircraft, four MIG-23 fighter jets were
scrambled from Smirnkyh Air Base.

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MOLLY: Keeping track of both the MIGS and the commercial airliner proved
difficult for the Soviets. Their major radar dish had been damaged ten
days earlier by artic gales. This meant they had to rely on less advance
radar systems scattered along the coast. None of which were seemingly
able to identify KAL 007 as a commercial jet.

RICHARD: Though officially reports said the radar was fine, this was a lie. Had the
radar been working it would have been able to properly detect whether the
trespassing aircraft was civilian or military.

MOLLY: General Valery Kamesky, commander of the far east district air defense
force at the time, ordered the strange aircraft not be shot down until
positively identified.

RICHARD: However his subordinate, Anatoly Kornukov, argued that regardless of

what it was, it needed to be destroyed.

MOLLY: For over an hour, KAL 007 skirted back and forth between the buffer zone
and Soviet airspace. All while being tracked by the Soviet military.

RICHARD: Finally, KAL 007 was reclassified as a military target, and additional
fighters were scrambled.

(SFX: JETS FIRING)

RICHARD: Three SU-15 fighters were launched and joined the MIG-23s in their
pursuit of KAL 007. It wasn’t long until the faster SU-15s caught up to the
rear of KAL 007.

MOLLY: The SU-15 pilots couldn’t identify the aircraft. So, under orders from base,
the SU-15 fired warning shots.

(SFX: MACHINE GUNFIRE)

RICHARD: The problem was the rounds being used weren’t tracer rounds or
incendiary rounds, but armor piercing. That meant they were hard to
visually detect. So the only way to detect the rounds was to have them
actually hit the plane?

MOLLY: Meanwhile, inside the cockpit of KAL 007, everything was… fine?!

Transcripts recovered the cockpit and black box recordings of flight crew
conversations revealed that KAL 007’s crew had no idea what was going
on.

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RICHARD: Really? No one mentioned anything about their course, or odd readings
from the instruments?

MOLLY: Nope. As far as the records show, they had no idea they were in Russian
airspace. Let alone being followed by fighter jets. In fact, the only contact
they had was with Tokyo ATC for clearance to ascend higher to preserve
fuel.

RICHARD: Oh man. They really had no idea.

MOLLY: Doesn’t look that way.

RICHARD: As the plane rose in the air the pursuing jet fighters overshot the plane,
and took the ascension as evasive actions. General Kornukov then gave
the order for the plane to be immediately shot down.

MOLLY: The planes regrouped, and at 18:26 UTC, reestablished visual contact with
KAL 007. One of the pilots noted that the plane had flashing lights, and
thought it looked like a civilian plane. General Kornukov however didn’t
care. He simply commanded the aircraft be destroyed, saying “Destroy the
target! Carry out the task! Destroy it!

RICHARD: So at 18:26, missiles were locked..

(SFX: COMPUTER PINGING LOCKED)

RICHARD: and fired…

(SFX: MISSILE FIRE AND EXPLOSION)

MOLLY: Two air-to-air missiles struck the rear of the plane at 35,000 feet. Shrapnel
from the plane severed crossover cables that allowed the plane to go up or
down. This sent the plane shooting up into the air.

RICHARD: Three out of four hydraulics were either damaged or destroyed, causing
extreme oscillations of the plane.

MOLLY: Further records indicate that there was rapid decompression of the
fuselage. The pilots panicked and began to radio for help. They now
realized they were hit!

(SFX: PLANE GOING DOWN)

RICHARD: Then at 18:27 UTC. The recorders cut out…

23
MOLLY: According to reports, it looks like the plane didn’t explode, but instead
gradually descended until finally spiraling and crashing over Moneron
Island.

RICHARD: Meanwhile the Soviets quickly realized that they had made a huge
mistake.

(SFX: BOAT ENGINES ROARING)

MOLLY: According to the memos the Soviets launched two search and rescue
operations. The first was authorized from Smirnkyh air Base at 18:47, just
twenty minutes after the plane went down.

RICHARD: Eight minutes later a second was sent using civilian trawlers.

MOLLY: Within three days of searching, the Soviets were able to locate the
wreckage off the coast of Moneron Island at depths of 174 meters.

RICHARD: An interesting note, the Russians didn’t find any bodies either. According
to reports from divers, all they could find were similar body parts but no
whole remains.

MOLLY: How awful. Looks like that decompression theory holds true.

RICHARD: I’m afraid so. But with that, the story of KAL 007 was finally revealed.

(SFX: ECHOED MUMMERING, PHOTOGRAPHY FLASHES)

MOLLY: By the tail end of 1993, the ICAO gave an updated report. They
reconfirmed much of what had been in the previous report, but with the
additional information the Russians supplied.

In the end, they stood by their previous assessment that KAL 007’s
intrusion into Soviet airspace had been an unintentional error. One not
detected by its crew.

RICHARD: Yet despite the new report confirming much of the old report, it brought to
light new information that helped Hans and the American Association for
Families of KAL 007.

MOLLY: Thanks to the details involving the hull being punctured, was able to win
additional damages for himself and all the other families associated with
KAL 007.

Additionally, the families of KAL 007 successfully lobbied congress and

the airline industry to accept an agreement that would ensure that future

24
 victims would be compensated quickly and fairly by lowering the burden
of proof for airliner misconduct.

MOLLY: So while it was a bittersweet moment, at least the world finally had some
closure for the deaths of 269 innocent people….

CLOSER

(FADE IN OUTRO MUSIC)

RICHARD: It looks like the fate of KAL 007 was revealed to have been nothing short
of a perfect storm of user errors.

MOLLY: Indeed. It was a series of minor miscalculations and misjudgments that

lead to a horrific tragedy. And though we may never know what happened
to the bodies, I think it’s safe to say those people’s souls can rest easy
knowing their loved ones have found some kind of closure.

RICHARD: Yes, even with the intense cold war tension, countries were united briefly
if only to ensure such a tragedy like this wouldn’t happen again. Air travel
was improved through new technology, better regulations, and joint efforts
to monitor the airways.

MOLLY: And though 269 lives were lost, their memories are still honored to this
day. Flight number 007 is retired from Korean Airlines rosters, and on
Sakahlin Island near the coast where the plane crashed a small cemetery
marker was made as a gesture by Russian.

RICHARD: Perhaps greatest of all, on the island of Wakkanai Japan, a ninety-foot

tower comprised of 269 stones was erected. Each stone representing a life
lost. It still stands tall to this day, a reminder to what can happen, if we all
don’t work together to mutually assure each other’s safety.

(THEME MUSIC)

MOLLY: Thanks for tuning in to Gone. Be sure to join us next week for our latest
investigation.

RICHARD: Don’t forget to like and share your favorite episodes, and be sure to check
out some of our other great shows.

MOLLY: Have a terrific week. And remember… Just because something is missing,
doesn’t mean it can’t be found.

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