I wanted to go home.. sport’s not a matter of life and death
THIS is the continuing story of my close up coverage of the terrorist attack at the 1972 Munich Olympics. A quick recap – I was dragged out of bed at 5.30am by ITN from my room near the Olympic Village after an early tip from security forces that eight armed Palestinian terrorists from the Black September group has broken into the Israeli quarters. They had already killed two athletes and taken another nine hostage.
The date was September 5, which was the scheduled rest day at the Olympics. By the early hours of the following day, through sheer German incompetence, the death tally was 11 Israeli athletes, five terrorists and one German policeman.
I had spent the day with the film crew reporting 50 yards from the hostage scene. As I ran the roles of film (snaking my way past the waiting Munich police) to a rendezvous spot where presenter Dickie Davies was waiting over the fence, I tried to tell lounging British athletes what was happening. To my disgust they were disinterested. Sometimes sport and its demands get out of all proportion.
By late evening I was tired, cold and exhausted but went to bed believing that the hostages had been saved.how wrong I was.
The next morning the same ITN reporter that had dragged me out of bed the previous day broke the news of the tragedy at Furstenfeldbruck Airport. He was Gerald Seymour, a battle hardened international reporter later to become a multimillionaire best selling novelist.
Gerald had gone on to the airport after both of us had covered the hostage negotiations.
I was shocked as he explained the way the German police had handled matters. To start with a German assault team had tried to break into the Israeli quarters in the village only to realise that the world – and the terrorists inside the house – were watching them on live TV!
So the drama switched to the airport.
There was a dispute between the German Army and the police. The result was that the armed but untrained police were waiting to fire at the two landing helicopters with the bound and blindfolded hostages and their terrorist captors inside. Several armoured cars on their way to the airport were stuck in traffic. The situation was becoming chaotic.
Nearby was the waiting Lufthansa plane that the Black September group had demanded to fly the Israelis and themselves to a Middle East destination. The “crew” was German police in disguise. One of the terrorists inspected the plane and sussed the situation.
The other police opened fire, killing some terrorists, but a grenade was thrown into each of the helicopters, killing all the shackled Israelis.
The carnage continued. It was terrible. You had the impression that the Germans never wanted an exit for the terrorists.
The three surviving terrorists were imprisoned but later swapped in hostage exchange unconnected with the Olympics.
As I listened to Gerald I felt physically sick. I had grown up listening to my father Jack’s tales of the Second World War. He had miraculously survived 40 bombing missions in the RAF’S slowest bomber, the Handley Page Hampden, known as the ‘flying coffin’.
I just wanted to go home, sickened by the whole thing. Instead, the Games were suspended for just 24 hours “out of respect” and then continued.
There was an argument that you would be giving into the terrorists, but sport is not a matter of life and death.
I was reminded about that only this month with the Denmark v Finland Euro 2020 match after Christian Eriksen had a cardiac arrest and
‘died’ on the pitch but was thankfully saved in distressing scenes. Did the match really have to continue?
By the end of the Olympics the ITN executive producer in Munich, David Phillips, was offering me a job within earshot of my boss at ATV, Tony Flanagan. I had joined ATV as their new sports presenter ten months earlier.
Tony was angry and told me: ‘‘You must not go. I will give you a staff job on our return. You will get a final salary pension and be grateful in years to come.”
Reminding me that I had become engaged to Katie (who was in the
ATV newsroom) the previous month, Tony was right! It was the best professional decision that I ever made.
Next week: How I was the only outsider on the Cathay Pacific plane carrying the England team pre-euro 1996 from Hong Kong with Paul Gascoigne up to his tricks.