Departure and Flight
Pan Am Flight PA103 departed from London-Heathrow's runway 27R at 18:25, bound for New York. The aircraft reached level flight at flight level 310 (FL310) 31 minutes after departure. At 19:03, while Shanwick Oceanic Control transmitted an oceanic clearance, an explosion occurred in the forward cargo hold at position 4L.
Explosion and In-Flight Breakup
The detonation produced a large hole in the fuselage structure and disrupted the main cabin floor. Major cracks propagated from the hole, and containers and cargo items ejected through it, striking the empennage and the left and right tail planes. The forward fuselage and flight deck area separated while the aircraft was in a nose-down and left roll attitude, peeling away to the right at Station 800. The nose section subsequently knocked the number 3 engine off its pylon. The remaining structure disintegrated as it descended nearly vertically from 19,000 to 9,000 feet.
Ground Impact
A section of the cabin floor and baggage hold, spanning approximately from Station 1241 to 1920, fell onto housing at Rosebank Terrace in Lockerbie. The main wing structure struck the ground at Sherwood Crescent, Lockerbie, with a high yaw angle, causing a massive fire.
Bomb Origin
The Semtex explosive device that caused the explosion had likely been hidden inside a radio cassette player. It was transferred to PA103 from a Pan Am Boeing 727 flight that had arrived from Frankfurt.
Investigation and Legal Proceedings
After a three-year joint investigation by the Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), indictments for murder were issued on November 13, 1991, against Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, a Libyan intelligence officer and head of security for Libyan Arab Airlines (LAA), and Lamin Khalifah Fhimah, the LAA station manager at Luqa Airport in Malta. United Nations sanctions against Libya and protracted negotiations with Libyan leader Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi led to the handover of the accused on April 5, 1999. On January 31, 2001, Megrahi was convicted of murder by a panel of three Scottish judges and sentenced to 27 years in prison. Fhimah was acquitted.