Two In The Think Tank - 334 - Pan Am Flight 73

Episode Date: March 16, 2022

On September 5th, 1986, Pan Am flight 73 landed in Karachi, with the intention of a brief stop over before flying to Frankfurt. But the plane never left the tarmac, and dozens were killed and many more were injured over the next 17 hours.Support the show and get rewards like bonus episodes: dogoonpod.com or patreon.com/DoGoOnPod Submit a topic idea directly to the hat: dogoonpod.com/Submit-a-Topic Come to our live podcasts in April: https://www.trybooking.com/BXSIVSee our quiz show live at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival: https://www.comedyfestival.com.au/2022/shows/the-quiz-show See Matt and Alasdair at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival: https://www.comedyfestival.com.au/2022/shows/honk-honk-hubba-hubba-ring-a-ding-ding Check out our AACTA nominated web series: http://bit.ly/DGOWebSeries​ Twitter: @DoGoOnPodInstagram: @DoGoOnPodFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/DoGoOnPod/Email us: [e-mail] Check out our other podcasts:Book Cheat: https://play.acast.com/s/book-cheatPrime Mates: https://play.acast.com/s/prime-mates/Listen Now: https://play.acast.com/s/listen-now/ Our awesome theme song by Evan Munro-Smith and logo by Peader Thomas REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING:https://allthatsinteresting.com/neerja-bhanothttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neerja_Bhanothttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_Am_Flight_73https://www.panam.org/global-era/591-neerja-bhanot-2https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-35800683 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Just jumping in really quickly at the start of today's episode to tell you about some upcoming opportunities to see us live in the flesh. And you can see us live at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival 2024. We are doing three live podcasts on Sundays at 3.30 at Basement Comedy Club, April 7, 14 and 21. You can get tickets at dogo1pod.com. Matt, you're also doing some shows around the country. That's right. I'm doing shows with Saren Jayamana, who's been on the show before. We're going to be in Perth in January, Adelaide in February, Melbourne through the festival in April, and then Brisbane after that. I'm also doing Who Knew It's in Perth and Adelaide. Details for all that stuff at mattstuartcomedy.com.

We can wait for clean water solutions. Or we can engineer access to clean water. We can acknowledge indigenous cultures. Or we can learn from indigenous voices. We can demand more from the earth. Or we can demand more from ourselves. At York University, we work together to create positive change for a better tomorrow. Join us at yorku.ca slash write the future. Hello and welcome to another episode of Do Go On. My name is Dave Wannake and as always I'm here with Matt Stewart and Jess Perkins.

Hello Dave. Hey Dave, thanks so much for welcoming us along to this podcast. Hey, you're back. You've been away. Yeah, thanks for welcoming me back. You've been away for a little while, even though in podcasting terms only for one episode, but you've been away for what, a month even though in podcasting terms, only for one episode. But you've been away for, what, a month? Yeah, I have gotten married. He did it.

He did it. I can't believe it. I said it couldn't be done. Yeah. No confirmation on any sort of after hours activities. And Dave, that's not us asking, okay? No. We don't want to know.

We don't want to know. He keeps trying to tell us and we say david enough of that first thing jess messaged me dave's a very honest man and he is still wearing the v badge so we can make assumptions based on that yeah i hope you didn't get married to end the virgin jokes because that has absolutely that's not gonna happen, it's three of us here and only one of us is married, so only one of us has had sex. So, thank you so much. And I've also, I've been on a honeymoon. I went to Gay Paris.

Yeah. Wow. Had a great time. So cool. So, you brought me back a magnet. So, you are welcome back to the podcast. That's right. That was your entry requirement.

Caught up with a few of our previous episode topics. Did you? Saw the Mona Lisa. Oh, yep. Went up the Eiffel Tower. You went up with a few of our previous episode topics. Did you? Saw the Mona Lisa. Oh, yep. Went up the Eiffel Tower. You went up it? Oh, yeah. I hope you got married first.

And not to the Eiffel Tower. Yeah. Dave, can you confirm or deny that you are married to the Eiffel Tower? She's taken. I tried. Did you meet Terare? Was he French? Yeah, he was French.

Yeah, well, I ate about as much food as that guy did. But you spread it out over a couple of weeks. He would do that for breakfast. Do it in the city, yeah. It's so cool you travel overseas. They said it couldn't be done. I know. First marriage, now overseas travel.

Wow. Anything's possible these days. A box, a and a and a couple weeks honeymoon you squeeze all that into the week off you had from the podcast it was an amazing effort yeah we're really proud of you um and uh and welcome back hey thank you so much great to be back i heard your episode with cas page last week with hetty lamar as the topic and if you haven't heard that one what are you doing people it people? It was great. It's a good story. And like a name that was, I think like Cass said,

it's right in the back of the brain. It's vaguely familiar, but it's one that we should know. Yeah, and this will help people if you're thinking Hedy Lamarr, her full name is Hedwig. That's right. That might help ring a few bells. If you're like, oh, Hedwig Lamarr, yes. Yes.

Dave, you know what you do best? It's so good to have you back here to help us plug some live shows. Yeah, we sucked at it. I heard you have your best go at it last week. And then you'd forgotten the date, the time, the venue. In a charming way. Yeah, we're adorable. Hey, everyone.

None of that charm and all of the business right here. We are doing four podcasts next month live in Melbourne at the European Beer Cafe. We've done these the last few years. It's a great venue, great time. And we're doing them on Sundays at 8.45 p.m. Prime time. Prime time. April 3rd.

When I was a kid, that's when they played the latest released blockbuster movies from two or three years earlier. Yes. And you'd be like, ooh, here we go. Wow, I haven't seen this yet. But you haven't seen this yet, which is our live shows April 3rd, April 10th, April 17th, April 24th.

Season passes are available where you get to see all four shows for the price of just three. Jeez, that's good value. Bloody hell, that's good value. And if you're a Patreon supporter, you get an extra 20% off as well. So, whoa. So, that's good value. Bloody hell, that's good value. And if you're a Patreon supporter, you get an extra 20% off as well.

So, whoa. So, that's great value. Those tickets are on sale now at dogoonpod.com. You can find the ticket link as well as the ticket link to our three live quiz shows. Do Go On, the quiz show at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. And those are on Monday nights at 9pm, April 4, 11 and 18. So we are doing seven live shows next month. Please come to the mall.

Come to the mall. We'll give you a little prize if you come to the mall. Oh, okay. How about we give you a do-go-on badge if you come to a mall? Okay, we don't... Oh, yeah, we have badges. Yeah. I was like, Dave, we don't have time to get badges, mate. We have badges.

I'll give you my V badge if you come to them all. Dave. No. I meant the actual badge. You're a married man. Oh, my God. So, yeah, and the quiz show, basically, we pick a topic and then I quiz Matt and Jess and two guests each week about the topic.

So, it's kind of like a report, but there's points involved. Yeah. That's a report only better. It's competitive. Exactly. Which is what me and Jess love. We's a report only better. It's competitive. Exactly. Which is what me and Jess love. We love to battle it out. You can win the report.

And I'm also doing a show the second half of the festival called Rubber Hubba. Honk, no. Honk, honk. Hubba Hubba Ring-a-ding-ding. With Alistair Tremblay-Birchall. I'm not on Monday nights. Angus Gordon's on Monday nights

because I'm doing the quiz show. But it's at the Bard's Apothecary. I think this is the first time I've known the name of the venue. And you still mispronounced it. Which bit? All of it? Apothecary.

Apothecary. Is it Bard though? Yes. Bard's Apothecary. Apothecary. Apothecary. I'm realising that I... Playing Wordle

when I think I've spelt a word correctly and I've put the word... Anyway, so... What are they, only five letters? Only five letters and I'm still muddling it. You're trying to put in apothecary? This is Wordle. I'm playing muddle.

And it's a comedy show. It should be a bit of fun. That would be great. I'd love to see you there. I mean, you and Al, two comedians I love so dearly as people and as performers. That's so nice of you to say. The show title, the best thing I've ever heard in my life. And I've listened to The Beatles.

Whoa. And the poster is incredible as well. There should be awards for best show title and best poster. Yeah. And you would win both this year. That would be so good. Content of the show,

who cares? It's great. Got a great name, got a great poster. Yeah. Content of the show is the only thing I'm responsible for.

So you're the only one who cares about it. Yeah, that's right. No one else cares. That's right. You get the people to do the poster who know what they're doing.

You get people to name it who know what they're doing. And the rest just falls into place. Yeah, you just have a bloody go. Yeah. And how many shows are you doing? Like 10 or something?

Something like 10. So if you go to all 10 of Matt's shows, we'll give you a second badge. Yeah. How about that? I think that's a good deal. Yeah, but Dave, you've been away for a little while. I'd love to hear what you think our show is. Yeah, refresh your own memory.

Right. Well, if I recall from last week's episode, listening back, it's about spoof. Yeah, it was a lot of spoof chat. Maybe too much, some would argue. Not me. That was Cass, though. That's why we didn't invite her back this week. So, I was sitting at my desk and editing that episode and started cackling laughing.

Really? Like, it really caught me off guard guard even though i was there and i was laughing my head off it was very funny oh that's good yeah i'd love for someone to walk in and see you laughing and they say what are you laughing at oh just me all right dave can't do it i'll do it it's not about spoof well sometimes it is but it's about uh normally an event or a person or a place from history and uh one of the three of us goes away and researches this topic. Comes back to the group with a report. Tells it kind of like an old school report.

And the other two listen politely and don't interrupt and be annoying and go on tangents. And this week Jess is doing the report. And Jess is going to start her report with a question. As we always do. Jess, what is your question this week? My question is, who is the youngest recipient of the Ashoka Chakra Award, India's highest peacetime gallantry?

Gandhi. It's not. Gandhi Jr. It's not. Gandhi Sr.? I've made this a difficult question. That's quite specific. It's a very specific question.

So it's not a... Sashantan Dukkha. No, it's not a... Sashantanduka. No, it's not. We're just going to be naming Indian people we know now, aren't we? Should we ask what the answer is? Yeah. Ravishankar. It's not Ravishankar.

It is a young woman by the name of Neerja Banut. And this report is about two things. It's about a devastating event and the brave young woman who was involved. Okay. And what was the award is for? It's the highest peacetime gallantry award. It's essentially for like bravery or yeah.

Yeah, the kind of thing you could see me winning. Exactly right. Yeah. Yeah. Might get in contact with the organisers and find out why I haven't. Have you conducted any bravery in India? Not in India. Yeah.

Well, then that's probably... You've done it for India. I've been brave for India. Every time he saved a kid from walking onto the street, he said, for India! But you haven't done it in India. Oh, it's got to be in India. Oh, I might pop over. Yeah, pop over.

Do some bravery. I might go do some bravery over there. What kind of bravery are you going to do? Stop a kid walking into traffic is one that I've heard of. Yep. You know, the list goes on. But, yeah. I don't know.

Maybe I'll get some tips from this week's episode. Yeah, maybe. Oh, I don't know if you want to from this one. So it's a pretty wild story. It's been suggested by a couple of people. Luke Holhouse and Garrett Coates have suggested this topic. And it's essentially centered around this young woman, Nija Banut. She's the, as I said, youngest recipient of India's highest peacetime gallantry,

the Ashoka Chakra Award, as well as several other accolades from governments of Pakistan and the United States. Matt, have you got those ones? Yeah, I think I've collected most of those. You've got high accolades from Pakistan and the US. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Where else have you got accolades from? Ivory Coast.

Yep. Wow. You also just won Best Show Title, apparently, in the Melbourne from? Ivory Coast. Yep. Wow. You also just won Best Show Title, apparently, in the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Yeah. Best Show Title for bravery. Bravest Show Title. Imagine bravest effort.

Oh, that would hurt so bad, wouldn't it? Hey, you had a go. And it was ambitious. Nobody wanted to see what you were putting out there Hey, you had a go. And it was ambitious. Nobody wanted to see what you were putting out there, but you did it anyway. They didn't care that you failed. Yeah, and that's so brave. That's brave. So brave.

So Neesha was born in India in September of 1963. Grew up in Mumbai, and it was while she was attending St. Xavier's College that she was spotted one day by a modelling agent. She had quite a successful modelling career, and in 1985, when she was attending St Xavier's College that she was spotted one day by a modelling agent. She had quite a successful modelling career and in 1985 when she was 22 she entered an arranged marriage as was pretty standard, pretty custom at the time and as usual her husband was sort of chosen by her family. But soon she discovered her husband was pretty abusive, he was mean and in a

real tradition shirking move she divorced him after two months, returning home to her parents. It also happened that in 1985, Pan American World Airways decided to hire an all-Indian cabin crew for its Frankfurt to India route, so any sort of flights going from India, they would usually sort of stop, yeah, in Frankfurt

and then on to the US. So Nija applied and she was successful. I do not understand geography. Yeah. Is that in a somewhat straight line? Who are you looking at? How dare you look at me as you ask that question? India to Frankfurt to the US.

Yeah, you go up into Europe, refuel for a bit, then go across the Atlantic. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I was just double checking easy peasy sometimes it's braver to tell you people when you don't know something oh my god that's so true yeah and i didn't know i didn't know i just i read it that's right and i believed it yeah that's brave thank you to blindly believe yeah is brave and i do it so often i read something i see a tiktok and, well, that must be true.

And that must be the only way you can do things. Yeah. And there must be no wiggle room in that thing that that person is saying. So I guess I can't eat carbs ever again. They said it very confidently. They said if I just do this particular combination of things on a stair machine at the gym, I'll have abs? Oh my God. That says a lot about my algorithm.

I've got to watch that corner of TikTok. Yours are mostly stair machine videos? Stair machine, what I eat in a day videos where people just tell you what they eat in a day. Really? I don't care.

And is it like interesting like they've eaten like a fucked up amount of food? No, it's usually like they haven't eaten enough. Like I'm watching no it's usually like they haven't eaten enough oh like i'm watching that going oh it's you haven't eaten enough today but they're going see you tomorrow and i'm like oh that's bad you're gonna you're not looking after your body i was thinking it was gonna be like the rock on a cheat day or something you're like wow

wow the rocks 6 000 pancakes no it's always a a woman who lives in a uninteresting city in the u.s and takes lots of videos of herself in active wear and eats acai bowls wow what's your what's the least interesting u.s city to you what's the most boring one i don't know somewhere in utah one? I don't know. Somewhere in Utah or something? I don't know. I can't believe Utah. It's just funny. The Beehive State, come on.

Are you on TikTok now, Matt? No, I'm on Google Maps. Oh, yeah? Are you looking at India? I just want to picture it. Looking at Frankfurt? Frankfurt. Can't find a way.

Well, Google Maps hasn't heard of planes. Come on. Yeah, Google Maps isn't great when you're like, how long will it take me to fly from here to here? And it's like, you can't get from that place to that place. No, you can. You can't. But you could take an Ola or a Diddy ride.

Yeah, it's always like. It'll only cost you 8,000 euros. Did you want me to call you a Diddy? No, Google. No. Figure out what a plane is, you idiot. So anyway, she's got the job with Pan Am. So she goes to Miami, Florida for training.

Love it. Returns from Florida, not just with training as a flight attendant, but as a head purser, which is essentially like she'd be senior flight attendant. She's in charge, acting as head of the cabin crew nice so she got to work working flights between mumbai and other parts of the world and continued her modeling career alongside her job at pan am sounds bloody delightful doesn't she's a triple threat she's a steward she's the head steward and she's a model and a divorce divorcee. Yeah. Quadruple threat. She can do it all.

Dave, you're the closest one of us three to being a divorcee. You're two steps away. I'm only one step away. At any given time, I am two steps away from being a divorcee. Imagine that. One step from being a hunky divorcee. That's a rebrand I'm hoping to avoid. Oh, okay.

You want to stay married, do you? Yeah, so far it's great. So far it's great. You get to go to Paris. He loves being a hunky husband. He loves being a hunky hub. This report's about to get quite bad. Bad or dark?

Dark. Okay. Not bad. Poorly written. As in badly researched, poorly written. Poorly written. Haven't proofread this. Yeah, so just, you know.

Great, so let's remember the good times. Good times. You know, she's left a bad man. She's got a great career. She's young. She's modelling. She's a flight attendant. She's having a bad man. She's got a great career. She's young. She's modelling. She's a flight attendant. She's having a great time.

Great. But that brings us to the main event of this report. So Pan Am Flight 73 was a flight from Bombay, India to New York with scheduled stops in Karachi in Pakistan and Frankfurt, Germany. Geez, they love Frankfurt. They love it. Nija was a senior flight purser on September 5th, 1986, when Pan Am Flight 73 landed in Karachi at 4.30am,

carrying 403 passengers, an American flight crew, and 13 Indian flight attendants. 109 of the passengers disembarked at Karachi. And so, like, not everybody's, I mean, barely anybody's doing that full trip. You know, peoplearked at Karachi. And so, like, not everybody's, I mean, barely anybody's doing that full trip. You know, people are stopping in Karachi. There's a bunch of English people who were having a holiday in India that are stopping in Frankfurt and then going to London from there.

So, yeah, that's why there's quite a few stops. That makes sense. But the crew, or like I think the flight attendants do, surely they can't do all of that. There must be swaps at different times. But yeah, that's sort of where the plane goes anyway with different crews. So yeah, about 100 people get off.

And this is a thing, right? There's quite a few resources about this, but a lot of them have the exact same wording as each other. So one of them was first and others have sort of written articles based off that article some of the numbers change a fair bit in terms of like how many people were on board etc so i've done my best to try and get it as accurate as possible but like you just add them all together get an average for each of the numbers that's what you

did oh that's good you added them all together you didn't average for each of the numbers. Is that what you did? Oh, that's good. You added them all together. You didn't get the average though, did you? I just added them all together. So there were 9,000 people on this flight. Yeah, is that not right? Yeah. So yeah, 100 people get off at Karachi and a fresh busload of passengers are making their way across the tarmac to board the plane around 6 a.m.

At the same time, however, two Pakistan Air Force, two Pakistan Airport Security Force officers Whoa. Oh, no. So they've hijacked a security car on the way there they've it's not even i don't even think they hijacked a security car i think they made a car look like right um the security cars looked and they got through a checkpoint it had a homemade spoiler on the back. And a lightning bolt up the side. And they got to the security checkpoint and went, hey.

It was just a cardboard thing. Their legs are coming out the bottom. Straps over the side. Vroom, vroom. Toot, toot. Let us in. And the other security guards said, yeah, I see nothing wrong with this. Yeah, great.

This makes sense to me. They were joined by two other men, one of whom had a briefcase full of grenades, which is not what you want to have in a briefcase. Wow. What sort of business is he conducting? Yeah. Is he an arms dealer? Should be full of pens. Every time I see a man with a briefcase, which you don't see as much anymore, I feel.

I saw one on the plane when I was going overseas, and I thought to myself, you don't see that very often. No, you don't see them anymore. Just load up the briefcase up top. My dad always took a briefcase to work every single day, come home with his briefcase. The sound of opening a briefcase, like it's, yeah. My dad was a teacher and he had a briefcase. Really?

Like a brown leather briefcase. Yeah. Click. You don't see them that much anymore. And I just assumed that's what I was going to do as an adult. Have a briefcase. Yeah. Go off to work. Do you think we don't see them that much anymore And I just assume that's what I was going to do as an adult Have a briefcase Yeah Go off to work Do you think we don't

Whatever that means Do you think we don't see them as much anymore Because like everything's on your phone or on a computer Yeah And bags They're just made more comfortable bags Yeah Like a satchel

Or a backpack You can put things in a backpack Yeah like you can put grenades in a backpack Yeah exactly You've got a laptop bag and you're good to go You don't need your whole briefcase. Yeah. That's sad for briefcases.

I know. The briefcase industry, no one talks about it. The attaché. Went the way of the horse and cart. But I imagine, every time I see a briefcase, I imagine there's like three pieces of paper in there. Not a bunch of grenades, you know? Like there's a pen.

There's three pieces. You still laugh about horse and cart? It's because I was listening to last week's episode on the drive here and Matt referenced a horse and cart then as well. That's always on my mind. He's obsessed. Whenever people talk to me, I'm always thinking about, you know, cars, they're great, aren't they?

But let's just spare a moment for the horse and cart industry. That's right. He said the kids won't learn about horse and carts. Yeah, that's right. Like why do they bother teaching handwriting these days? You don't bother teaching about the horse and cart industry anymore. Don't teach a kid how to attach a horse to a cart. So anyway, now there's four.

Yes. So the two original ones wearing the security outfits were brandishing guns, firing shots into the air. Oh, gosh. Are they Texan cowboys? It's a bit odd. Gunfire struck and killed two Kuwait airline staff members working on an aircraft nearby,

and flight attendants were forced to close the plane door, but luckily, Neerja was out of sight of the hijackers and relayed the hijack code to the cockpit crew, alerting them to the situation. The hijack code? Yeah, there's like a code that she could... Because it's probably like, especially if you're in the situation the hijack code yeah there's like a code that she could because it's probably like especially if you're in front of the hijackers and they're saying get the crew out here you can't be like right hey um some hijackers here or something yeah maybe

hijack it hey well it's like some sort of code like oh would you like some cheese and bickies? Yeah. Yes. How many? Four with machine guns. Four cheese and bickies with machine guns and some grenades. Grenades, yes. Would you like a bag of grenades? I mean, you know, it'd be cracked pepper. So would you like cracked pepper on the cheese?

Hand grenades. Hand grenades on the cheese. It's really elaborate. They've got a menu with a code. Honestly, it was probably like a code brown or something. Salmon and cucumber. Oh, no. Rocket launcher.

Oh, no. How do you actually offer the captain lunch then? No, you can't. Footlong baguette. Oh, no. Can I get you a tea or coffee? Oh, God. Oh, no. Can I get you a tea or coffee? Oh, God. Oh, no.

Hold the sugar. So, just to recap, so she's outside of the plane. They've closed the doors so the hijackers can't get in? No, the hijackers are in and they've said close the doors. Okay, gotcha. So that they're all sort of – because they want to be on the plane and the plane take off and off we go. So the hijackers are on and they've – yeah, I guess sort of protect themselves

from anybody, any actual security guards outside being able to shoot at them or whatever. So they're all inside the plane and, yeah, luckily they haven't spotted her yet so she's able to get to an intercom and tell the cockpit what's happening and what that means is... They just hit the ejector seat. Leave everyone to barge. You're not far off.

It's not ejector seat. But the pilot, co-pilot and flight engineer were able to evacuate the aircraft out of an emergency hatch overhead. Which one of the flight attendants, Sunshine Veswala, was instructed by one of the hijackers to take them to the captain. And once they entered the cockpit, she said, I noticed immediately that the escape device

in the cockpit had been deployed. I noticed that the evacuation hatch on the ceiling of the cockpit was open, but I pretended not to. I wanted to give the pilots time to escape in case they were still in the process of climbing down the ropes

outside the plane. That's badass. So is she just like looking around the cockpit, like opening and stuffing? Maybe they're in here. Maybe this drawer? No. Sorry, don't mean to interrupt you. Yoo-hoo.

Yeah, so they're like, I mean, they're going, we leave, and then they can't force us to fly the plane. Exactly right. That's not like they're cowardly leaving. No. They're doing that to stop everyone on the plane from being flown somewhere dangerous. Exactly right.

And some people criticise the pilots for leaving the plane, but Sunshine says, I was relieved when I saw the pilots were gone as we were all safer on the ground than we would be in the air. And in any case, at least the three pilots were safe. Three lives would be saved. So, yeah, it immobilises the plane. They can't go anywhere.

And that was the whole plan, which I'll get to. But, yeah, another flight attendant added, the pilots evacuating the airplane meant that we were not at the mercy of the terrorists who could have instructed the plane to be flown into a building or could have been blown up in flight, mid-flight. So, it was better that they were on the ground. So it was good that the pilots got out. Yeah.

What year are we talking? 86. 86. A good year. Oh, generally speaking. Generally speaking. For music. Oh, yeah.

Fantastic year for music. There were some great pop hits that year. Probably. Sure Madonna was doing something about that time. Wham. Wham. I was going to say wham. We just get each other.

I reckon Molly Ringwald would have been top of the box office somewhere. Yeah. Breakfast Club would have been around that time. Yeah, for sure. Heaps of good stuff on the go. Saints were having a tough year in the footy. Were they? The 80s.

That was a dark decade for the Saints. Not a good year for Saints. Dark decade, really? Yeah, I think we've won five they? That was a dark decade. Not a good year for Saints. Dark decade, really? Yeah, I think we've won five or six wooden spoons maybe that decade. Damn, I was thinking of saying five or six games. Yeah, it's probably about the same. So yeah, with the escape of the pilots, the planes are mobilised, like we're saying. Didn't take long for the hijackers to realise the flight crew were gone, and so they would

be forced to negotiate with officials in order to get a new flight crew into the plane to fly it oh they're going to conduct interviews yeah oh god we're just going to go with the guys who left here but all right send them out tell us about yourself yeah why should we pick you it's not just about qualifications it's more about getting the someone with the right vibe yeah that's right you know it's it's so much of that sort of job interview process is actually about culture fit. Exactly. And then maybe you should ask me questions. Treat it like you're interviewing me as well.

Exactly right. We're a tight-knit group. We just want to make sure you're the right fit. I'm a pretty progressive boss. I actually have references of my own of people who have worked for me. If you wanted to have a chat to them. You're fantastic. Yeah.

That's such a funny thing. It's like, I'm very progressive. Here's some people saying nice things about me yeah that's so progressive of you i mean that's like that's your resume anyway yeah like it's all people who are going to say nice things here are some previous hijackers i've worked with they said i was very cool and calm i did what they said yep i was um you know i followed orders calmly Who here knows how to fly a plane? I reckon that would be a big question they would have been asking. Yeah, just in case.

Someone puts their hand up and their wife just slaps it down. Shut up, Jerry. You've played a flight simulator. Yeah, that's not true. It was a birthday present. You are not a pilot. We can wait for clean water solutions. or we can engineer access to clean water. We can acknowledge indigenous cultures, or we can learn from indigenous voices. We can demand more from

the earth, or we can demand more from ourselves. At York University, we work together to create positive change for a better tomorrow. Join us at yorku.ca slash write the future. Yeah, you know how like if there's a medical emergency on a plane, like is there a doctor? Oh, I've had that before. Have you? Yeah, so it's the middle of the night, flying from Melbourne to Europe a few years ago,

and we get like everyone's asleep and then it's like, ladies and gentlemen, we're just wondering if there is any doctors on board. You don't want to hear it. You're thinking, oh my God. And then about 20 minutes later, ladies and gentlemen, just letting you know, we have to make an unscheduled stop, an emergency landing in Colombo in Sri Lanka because that was basically the closest airport. And yeah, someone had to be taken off because they're having heart issues.

Oh my God. And as they're being taken off, you know, I'm looking away. You don't want to, you don't want to, you know, look at that.

Someone gets their phone out, starts filming the person being loaded into an ambulance. Absolutely wild. Always TikToking. Yeah, you always got to be TikToking.

But so, do you think there was, there was a doctor or, there's always like, surely in a, in a plane where you've got hundreds of people, you're going to have a nurse, doctor. Or a doctor of media. Yeah, a philosophy doctor.

Ah, yes. Yes. Oh, medical doctor. I've asked my chiropractor about that. I was like, do you ever – if people say Mr. Nelson, do you correct them and say doctor? And he goes, fuck no, because it'll be when I'm on a plane and they're like oh Dr Nelson we have a medical

emergency and he's like I know CPR or to adjust their spine I could crack their back so I'm not sure the sad thing is because you don't know that person they never know what happened to them I know fingers crossed that it was all good

yeah that's a scary thing to hear you're not following the right people on social media there would be multiple I know. Fingers crossed that it was all good. Yeah, that's a scary thing to hear. Yeah, you hear it and you go, oh, no. You're not following the right people on social media. There would be multiple. It's a funny instinct to be like, that person's in dire trouble. This could be good content. People process things in a lot of different ways. Here I am dining out on the story six years later.

We all get content different ways. Fair call. Yeah, that is very see but they were instant you bide your time and that's what we appreciate about you um so the hijackers were part of the abu nadal organization a palestinian terrorist organization backed by libya their plan was to reroute the uh the flight to cyprus and israel in order to free palestinian prisoners as well as to revolt against the united states by executing passengers of western origin okay that is scary shit yeah it's a bit full-on so they moved the first class and business class passengers back to the middle of the plane brought people from the back forward i know back into economy yeah it's like i paid for this flight kill me now i haven't even had my brekkie i'm not going back there nothing you can do will make me go back there with those

poor people and then you say the people at the back got brought to the front yeah everybody's just sort of it's so they're all in one area i thought that they were liberating the poor because it's like a 737 so they've brought everybody into one section. Yeah. Which means there's not enough seats for people, so people are sitting on the floors, in the galleys, by the doors. I was in a flatbed minutes ago. Yeah.

And now, I'm on the floor. Okay, I'll move, but can I still have my mimosa? Yeah, keep them coming. I don't know how to start my day. And so, yeah, it just kind of became... Mimosa's code for something real bad. Yeah, it's not good. Everyone shudders.

So it becomes a bit of this stalemate where they're kind of negotiating with people on the ground and this all happened at like 6 a.m by the way six yeah and by 10 a.m one of the hijackers ordered 29 year old rajesh kumar who was a kenyan-born indian who had recently been naturalized as an american uh they ordered him to come to the front of the aircraft he was then forced to kneel at the front doorway of the aircraft with his hands behind his head. The hijackers, who were negotiating with officials, in particular Viraf Daroga, the head of Pan Am's Pakistan operation, stating that if the crew was not sent on the plane within 30 minutes, then Kumar would be shot. Because he was a naturalised American.

He's an American. How'd they know? They're targeting Americans. No idea. I's an American. How'd they know? They're targeting Americans. No idea. I don't know. Interesting to note that the lead person on the ground negotiating... Was the head of Pan Am's Pakistan operation? I don't know.

So not like a police officer or anyone representing the government or anything like that. It's just someone... From Pan Am. From Pan Am. Yeah, wow. Yeah, it was a bit... I'm sure there must have been officials there and I think part of the military was sort of sent out

but it's a really delicate sort of hostage situation when you've got a plane full of people. Yeah. So, yeah, they couldn't exactly just barge in but it is interesting, I know, that the head of Pan Am is there. So they said, 30 minutes, you you got to get us a flight crew or we'll shoot this guy. But shortly after the hijackers became impatient

and shot Kumar point blank and then threw him out of the plane door onto a ramp below. Pakistani personnel on the ramp reported that Kumar was still breathing when he was placed in an ambulance, but he was pronounced dead on the way to the hospital in Karachi. So just awful. Horrendous. And so Nija and two other flight attendants were ordered

to begin collecting the passports of every passenger on board. Now, they feared for the safety of their 44 American passengers on board, so they hid the American passports under seats, in the galley, in their clothing, and down rubbish chutes. They just took all the American ones and hid them to protect them, which is pretty like if you're caught doing that as well, you're risking your own life in doing that. But they're like, no, we've got to protect them.

So the hijackers are then unable to find Americans because they don't know who's who. So they turned uh to the british essentially there's a man named michael john thexton was returning home to england after spending a holiday in pakistan and he was asked to come to the front of the plane where one of the hijackers safarini asked thexton if he was a soldier and if he had a gun and thexton replied no he asked thexton if he was married and talked to him about how he didn't like all this violence and killing and said that Americans

and Israelis had taken over his country and left him unable to lead a proper life. And eventually Thexton's just taken back to his seat. Very kind of strange behaviour. Oh, okay. So they're like taking one guy and shooting him on the spot, having a chat with another and that's somehow more unnerving than if they were just consistently violent because it

means they're unpredictable totally and that would happen in an action movie too with like a the head bad guy is so scary and unpredictable nice to some people and then you think he's going to kill someone else and he goes hey one more thing do you want a can of coke yeah just building the yeah and then they were okay and let them let them go that's exactly they asked texan do you want a glass of water or something oh man because you're thinking oh no are you married you'd be thinking fuck they're going to kill me yeah so strange um from an article from the bb it says, over the next few hours on the upper deck, Saffarini let his guard down several times, Sunshine says. He joked and flirted, invited her to go with him to Cyprus and promised to teach her to swim.

Sunshine remained alert. At one point, she looked longingly at the emergency axe in a glass box in the cockpit. Saffarini, mid-joke, caught her and immediately pointed a gun at her head. Don't even think about it, he said. So they're just so like erratic and inconsistent. It is like, yeah, really unnerving that he's sort of like he's flirting with her and he's like, hey, come to Cyprus. I'll teach you to swim. And he's like telling jokes and then threatening her. And it's

very strange and pretty wild. At one point, the hijackers threatened that if a pilot didn't arrive soon, a passenger would be shot every 15 minutes. I don't believe that did happen. But it was more of that erratic, unpredictable behavior that, yeah, would have made it a deeply stressful time. It would be deeply stressful regardless, but it's sort of, you know, you're kind of even more on edge. Nija and the other flight attendants handed out food and water,

trying to keep people as calm as possible as the ordeal continued into the night. Remember, this started about 6 a.m. This entire time, the air conditioning and lights had been on in the plane and as evening set in, the onboard power supply started to dwindle. The lights got dimmer and the cool air stopped circulating. There was a flight mechanic on board and he told the hijackers that when the power died, the emergency power would kick in and it would last about 15 minutes or so

before the aircraft would be completely dark. So essentially, they're running out of time. Right, they're going to need someone to jumpstart the plane. Yeah, get another plane in, back it up. Is it near a hill? Oh, yeah, rolling plane. Yeah, get another plane in, back it up. Back it up. Is it near a hill? Oh, yeah, rolling start. Yeah, that's not a bad idea. Are there often hills on runways?

Yeah. There's usually a hill at one end. Depends on the city. Melbourne's very flat, but, you know, Wellington I think is quite hilly. Yeah. Just to get a plane started. At around 9pm, the power did run out. Emergency lights came on.

This is from a website I found. It's pretty interesting. It's got a heap of sort of different stuff on there. It's called wikipedia.org. Okay. It's got all sorts of like, I don't know, tidbits. What about aviation? Mostly aviation, yeah.

Yeah, great. Sorry, almost exclusively aviation. That's great. Oh, fantastic. So from wikipedia.org says with the plane out of power and sitting in near darkness a hijacker at the l1 door said a prayer and then aimed to shoot at the explosive belt worn by another hijacker near the door the intent was to cause an explosion massive enough to kill all passengers and crew on board, as well as themselves. Since the cabin was dark, the hijacker missed, causing only a small detonation. Immediately, the hijackers began shooting their weapons into the cabin at passengers and attempted to throw their grenades.

Yet again, the lack of light caused them to not pull pins fully and to create only small explosions. caused them to not pull pins fully and to create only small explosions ultimately it was the bullets that created the most damage since each bullet would bounce off aircraft cabin surfaces and create crippling shrapnel wow so it sounds like that so one of them's just decided i've had enough let's just start yeah let's end it i wonder if it it feels like it wasn't really thought through because what you've you've raced up to the plane started shooting your guns very clearly made yourself obvious hijackers or obvious terrorists yeah um and then which gave the pilots chance to flee exactly so then the plane's just on the ground and and and you haven't even gotten close to your plan of rerouting it to Cyprus.

You're stuck in one place because you were too, I don't know, brash, whatever. So, yeah, maybe I don't know how much of a solid plan was in place here because, yeah, it does sort of seem like, well, there's no power. It's dark, which means they don't know what the passengers are doing and they're outnumbered in a big way by all the passengers so maybe in the dark now they're vulnerable too right but then also the guy that's just shot at his mate wearing the bomb wouldn't you just say to him hey pull the yeah on the same page yeah yeah that would definitely explode but it's going to kill all of you and not

even you know we're near where you wanted to go like your mission has completely failed yeah you guys have gone no the mission's over yeah let's kill everyone and it's better to kill everyone than to give up or i know a bit of a strange. I'm starting to think these guys are acting a bit illogically. I'm going to give them a little bit more time. What happens next? Time to decide. In the chaos, flight attendants and passengers scrambled to get the plane doors open, and at least three of the doors were opened quite quickly.

A couple of the doors were opened manually, which meant the emergency slide didn't deploy, but they're on the ground. So, it's still a fair drop, but like for quite a few of them, they were able to make the short jump out onto the wing of the plane. Or it was about, I think, a 15 to 20 foot drop to the ground from the doors. That's significant. Oh, it's significant.

Yeah, but like you'd risk a broken ankle over a bullet. You know, so people are going for it. An airline ground staff member who was on the plane was able to open the R4 door, and I think that was the one that the slide did deploy, which meant a lot of people got out that door. Right. So he saved a lot of lives there.

Nija opened one of the airplane doors, and even though she could have been the first one to jump out and flee, she instead started helping the other passengers escape. According to a surviving passenger, she was guiding the passengers to the emergency exit. That is when the terrorists were firing constantly, fearing a commando attack. They saw Nija relentlessly trying to help

three unaccompanied children out, and that is when they caught her by the hair and shot her point blank. Details are a little bit murky here, because the BBC article written on the 30th anniversary of the attack, Sunshine says that when all the passengers were off the plane, she and some of the crew, not hearing any more gunfire, but not knowing where the gunmen were,

went back into the dark plane to look for survivors and sunshine said she saw nearsha who was bleeding heavily but was conscious nearsha's colleague said she was still alive when she arrived at karachi's uh jinha hospital it was chaotic like a war zone in there nearsisha may still have been alive if she'd been cared for right away because there was so many people being taken there. Absolutely wild. So Nisha did sadly pass away from her injuries, not even two days before her 23rd birthday. Fuck.

And I know it seems like not the most do-go-on kind of topic when I'm talking about the details of a horrendous terrorist attack. But the fact that this young woman, she's 22, she's died protecting children, she's credited with – because, again, some of the resources and some of the other flight attendants take credit for being the one to alert the pilots. They say it wasn't NEAReraja, it was them.

Regardless, all of these people did some amazing things and saved a lot of lives and Neeraja lost her life protecting kids. It's incredible. The Pakistan Army's Special Service Group, the SSG, they were commandos and there was the Pakistan Rangers as well, were alerted to the situation very early on. And after the chaos of shots being fired and bombs going off, the SSG stormed the plane and seized the only remaining hijacker on board. Three others were nabbed as they tried to flee the airport. Oh, they thought they could get away. So they kind of got out in the emergency exits as well and tried to run for it.

Yep. But they were caught. One was still on the plane. The four hijackers and a fifth accomplice, who was arrested a week later, were convicted in Pakistan in 1988 for their roles in the hijacking and the murders and sentenced to life in prison. According to a CNN report,

Safarini, seems like he was kind of the head of it, was handed over to the FBI from a prison in Pakistan in September 2001. He was taken to the United States where on May 13, 2005, he was sentenced to 160 years in prison, which he's serving. Wow. The other four hijackers were deported by Pakistani authorities to Palestine in 2008 but were released by Palestinian officials. They remain at large today

and are still listed on the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorist page. Wow. So four of them are just out in the world, which is crazy. Yeah, pushing towards 40 years later. Yeah. And do we know how many people died? Yeah, I'll get to that and that's that's one of the numbers that it's like you get a few different figures sure so and i mentioned at

the start that this terrorist group were believed to be backed by libya and libya had been accused of sponsoring the hijacking this hijacking as well as carrying out the bombings of Pan Am Flight 103 in 1988, so a couple of years later, and UTA Flight 772 in 1989. In August of 2003, they accepted responsibility for the actions of its officials for the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, but were silent on this particular hijacking, Flight 73. And so in June of 2004, a volunteer group of families and victims of the incident formed to work towards a memorial for those killed in the incident to seek the truth behind this terrorist attack and to hold those responsible.

On April 5th, 2006, a law firm, Crowell and Mooring LLP, representing the surviving passengers, announced it was filing a civil suit in the US seeking $10 billion in compensation from Libya. But again, I don't even really think anything or much has come from that. So like I was saying before, I've read very contradictory numbers. Some sources say 20 people were killed. Others 50 i think it's probably 20 um and the number of people on board was either 380 or 360 so it most sources say 100 passengers were injured which is pretty amazing

giving that there's shrapnel and bullets yeah flying everywhere I mean, it's awful that anyone died, of course, but I thought that most of them were when there's explosions and bullets fired on a plane in such a small space. Wow. So if you – and, yeah, you would – ideally, zero lives would be lost. But when you look at the numbers of, say, there's 360 on board and 20 people have died, it's incredible that because flight attendants and also just passengers were able to get the doors open

and everybody could get out. It's incredible. So for her bravery, the government of India posthumously awarded Neja Banut the Ashoka Chakra Award. It's, as I was saying, India's highest gallantry award for bravery in the face of the enemy during peacetime so that's what it's specifically for i don't think i'm gonna win this one you don't reckon you could get you could be brave in the face of enemy during peacetime

no you don't need you don't need all the awards you've got enough yeah and i just think you need to believe in yourself i I just don't know. Maybe. Let's see. Hopefully we don't have to see. Never say never. She's the youngest recipient of this award and the first female recipient of the award.

What a freaking badass. So cool, but so sad. It's so sad. And this is why people suggested the topic because it was such a brave and amazing thing to do and even though in accounts that have sort of happened in the last few years you know people okay so a movie came out in 2016 about it's called near john it's about this attack and it's quite specifically obviously about her life. And, yeah, some people who I think were working on the flight as well

kind of criticised it as like she wasn't the only one who did brave stuff. And it's a bit like, okay, nobody thought she was single-handedly doing it, but she lost her life. Yeah. She lost her life trying to protect the passengers, which it seems she did. And I don't think that's a battle you want to... Yeah, surely giving her credit is not taking credit away from anyone else.

Exactly right. Yeah, I think that's the better way to say it. So after her death, her family set up the Nija Bhanut Trust with insurance money, and the trust presents two awards every year, one for a flight crew member worldwide who acts beyond the call of duty, and another, which is the Nija Bhanut Award, to an Indian woman who, when faced with social injustice, bravely faced the situation

and helped other women in similar social distress. Oh, that's great. What a great legacy. Yeah. Great tribute to her. A really nice tribute. In 2006, she and the other Pan Am Flight 73 flight attendants and Pan Am's flight director for pakistan were awarded the special courage award by the united states department of justice

and yeah the film i just mentioned came out in 2016 a biographical thriller called nija and maybe the most touching tribute to her life and sacrifice is that one of the children that she um was protecting when she died grew up to be a pilot and credits his life to her wow which is really really nice so yeah a little um sorry it was it was a dark story um but i don't know when when um luke and garrett suggested it it grabbed my attention because i wanted to tell more stories about badass women. I feel like we haven't really told many stories about women from India, people from India. So I thought that would be a kind of interesting story.

And do I regret it a little bit? Maybe. Why? That was a fantastic story. Yeah. Just like in terms of, yeah, gripping. Yeah. And I hadn't heard of the event at all.

Obviously, it was long before I was born because I'm incredibly young. And so, I don't know. She sounds like an amazing person. Yeah. Yeah. And so, yeah, that is the story of Neerja Bhanut and Pan Am Flight 73. That's a great, great report, Jess, and probably a good time to remind people that if you have an idea for a topic

that you'd like us to do, anyone can submit them at any time at dogoonpod.com. There's a little tab for submit a topic. And you can even tell us why we should do it because there's thousands of entries, but I'm not sure what caught your attention about it. But sometimes when you were scrolling through, people have said why we should do the topic. Yeah. Do you know what it was?

I searched in the hat for the phrase woman and just had a bit of a look through because I was like, I want to tell some more women's stories, women of color. Send us those. Absolutely. Please do. Do go on pod.com. We'd love to hear those topics yeah wow that uh that was a quite an incredible story bit heavy yeah but i i think it's i mean you know i think

it's important for stories to be told yeah i don't know if our podcast is necessarily always the best vehicle for those stories but i think you know it's it's cool that, I mean, I'm glad that I know about her. I think it's cool for people like her to be remembered. Absolutely. Well, Bob, thanks so much for that great report. That brings us to everyone's favorite section of the show, where we get to thank a lot of our great supporters who keep this show running.

It goes for about 30 to 40 minutes. To be precise. And so strap in and enjoy yourselves. Where, yeah, we thank a bunch of our supporters. You can support us if you want to at patreon.com slash dogoonpod or dogoonpod.com. And there's a bunch of different levels. You get different rewards for supporting the show.

Like there's a Facebook group you can join, which we call the nicest corner of the internet. You get to help vote for topics. At the moment, Dave and I, our episodes are being put up to the vote. And you can literally change what we do because my topic recently was won by a single vote. My next one. There you go.

One person changed it all. That's great. And yeah, there's all sorts of other things as well. Bonus episodes. We do three bonus episodes per month. And a bunch of things, including if you're on the Sidney Scheinberg Deluxe Memorial level, you get to give us a fact, a quote, or a question. This section actually has a little jingle that goes something like this.

Fact, quote, or question. Bing. He always remembers the ding. And on this section, if you give us a fact, a quote, or a question. You can send us a bit of photo. We could describe it to people. That'd be nice. And you also get to give yourself a title.

This week, as every week, I'll read out four. This week, starting with Murray Somerville, who does great artwork. Oh, Murray's great. Incredible artwork. And did the official Dougal on Christmas card. Yes. That's right. She's got a lot of love and is still arriving to people.

Even if you're listening to this in 2025, it's still arriving to people. Even if you're listening to this in 2025, it's still arriving. It's funny because it arrived for some people in December and then other people months into this year. It's always the way. So good. I love Murray's style. Murray's got the title of That 50s Ad Man

and Murray's asking a question, which is, when you're a kid, what's some food your mum or dad made that just can't be beat? And to this day, you still love. Murray looks like he answers the question. I want to hear Murray's answer. Yeah, Murray, tell us. What's the specialty?

We'll save for Sidney Scheinberg. In fact. Yeah, Murray, tell us. What's the specialty? We'll save for Sydney Scheinberg. In fact, quote or question, give us always, if you ask a question, give us an answer. Murray says, growing up, my mum made an incredibly tasty rissole and gravy dish. My rissoles are usually dry or crumble. Mum's were always just perfect. Oh, that's lovely. That's nice. See you around like a rissole.

One of the great sayings, I think. Yeah, well, I'll always love my mum's trifle. Oh, yeah? That was my favourite dessert as a kid. My dad did a trifle in any family gathering. He'd be bringing the trifle. Yes. Yeah, that's good.

And dad made great pasties. Ooh. Big, long pasties and they'd be cut up into three sections and I'd always want one of those end pieces because you've got the extra bit of pastry as sort of the scrunch of pastry at the end. Sort of the fold over bit.

Oh, so good. Yeah. I mean, Dad cooked the dinners at our place and he had, that was probably maybe my favourite in his repertoire, but he had a bunch of great ones.

That sounds yum. That sounds so good. Mum's always been a very good cook, good scones. But one that I miss because I don't eat it anymore is like a – we called it like an Irish stew. It was a beef stew she used to make and it was so good that sounds so good sounds hearty yeah and it was like it was good in winter and you'd have it the first night with like maybe some mashed potato but then it was even better the second day and we'd have it on like buttery toast which doesn't necessarily sound like it

would have like big big bits of potato and carrot and it was all slow cooked so it all just fell apart. Delicious. That sounds awesome. Dad is like very good at, it's so dumb. He just like thickly slices potatoes and puts them on the barbecue and we just call them dad's chips. And they're always like a bit burnt and i fucking

love them and if i'm there he has to make like double because i'll eat all of them delicious that's dad's specialty right you dave i was also gonna say my dad's barbecue potatoes yes which were always very well done but very very nice very very well done in both senses um the other thing i remember from my dad is the nostalgia of if i ever had someone stay over at our house like for a sleepover oh the next day dad would always that kind of sleepover no more you might say the v badge yeah firmly in place firmly in place and at that stage i didn't know it'd be in place for many decades to come. But he would make pancakes in the morning. Yeah.

And they would be not big pancakes but pikelets, like a small one. So everyone would get, you know, put four at a time. And it was cooked on like an electric stove that he plugged in and that was its sole purpose was cooking pikelets. I love it. So we never had a meal any other time cooked on there. And because I don't have access to that anymore, I can't make you can't have it it's so nice i used to we had family friends who i would stay over their place a lot because like this the dad of that family and my

dad grew up together um and the kids were all the same age so i stayed over there all the time and every morning pat would make us pancakes but they'd be like chocolate chip. And he'd make them in like I'd get a J and they'd get an S. You know, like we'd get the letters of our names and stuff. We'd go, ooh, it was the best. I love that. Mum used to make a custard, just like a hot bowl of custard for dessert occasionally and sprinkles in the letter of our first initial of our name so i get

the m you'd sort of eat around the sprinkles on the m and then eat the sprinkles yeah it must be really nice as a parent when like your kids or even like your kids friends and stuff are like looking forward to your specialty because i was like are we having pancakes pat are you making pancakes i'm just so excited there's a lot of of times where I can remember to being ungrateful a bunch as well. Like, oh, we're having that again? Yeah. And then thinking back to it now, you're like, I just spent ages making this, you little fuckhead. Yeah, you've got to eat.

You've got to eat your turn. I wouldn't say it, but that must have been in their head. Surely. And your parents had four kids to feed and be like, shut up and eat it for fuck's sake. I'd love to go back and just have a word to myself. Yeah, you shut up. Another one I always found fun, I loved it anyway, but it was just funny to think back.

It was chili con carne, but without the chili or the carne. Because carne means meat, I think. See, you just had the carne. So it was basically just rice with sort of a chili, the kidney beans and the sauce. But when I stopped eating meat he'd take that out so he'd be like it's chili con carne without the chili sans carne without the carne they'd all have the rest of the family have it with meat but I'd have to oh that's nice

because yeah around that time it was like you can start making your own dinner but some of the dishes he could just easily take the meat or not put the meat in. Anyway, great question, Mario. Jeez, that's taken me down a little place I like to call memory lane. Yeah, the memories and the nostalgia associated with that is really lovely. Good question. Gary J. from the UK. Okay, Prisoner24601.

That would be a reference maybe Dave gets. Do you want to Google that? It's at a reference to The Simpsons slash Les Mis. Oh, are you guessing or are you confident of that? And Gary's also asking a question. Gary J. writes, So, Grey's Anatomy, Season 7, Episode 18. The Flash, Season 3, Episode 17. Community, Season 3, Episode 10. me season 7 episode 18 the flash season 3 episode 17 community season 3 episode 10 futurama season

4 episode 8 fringe season 2 episode 20 scrubs i think has he sent us a list what i turned out because uh just there's no introduction of this it just goes straight into a list of thought i'd miss the bit where he said will there be information at the end, though? Well, I don't know. Scrub, season 6, episode 6. Xena, Warrior Princess, season 3, episode 12. Feels like he was meant to send this to his girlfriend or something. Hey, here's some episodes we should watch. Buffy, season 6, episode 7.

What do all these have in common? I reckon they're going to be named the same thing. Oh, he's given the answer. So do you want to have a... It's not named the same thing. It's a kind of... Kind of, you know, they're all genre episodes. Okay.

Musicals. Musicals. Damn it! Well done. Dave, Dave, Dave. Fuck you. Sorry. And Gary's question is,

when are you going to do a musical Do Go On episode? Gary, I've broken into song too often for you to ask that. You know it would be terrible. Yeah. He's just at the end doubted himself, said, wait, is this a suggestion or a question? We missed our opportunity when we had an amazing singer, Michelle Brazier, on the podcast.

Yeah. Oh, she'd be great. Put it on Fast and the and furious, the musical. We could do a musical, but we would just have to cast people as us. Oh, that's good. Okay. You know what I mean? Yeah.

That could be all right. Yeah, I like it. Michelle can sing. You know, even just people that we've had on before. Cameron James can sing. All right. Cameron James can play. Oh, he probably plays Dave.

Yeah, I think so. I think it's more in his wheelhouse. Both pop punk boys growing up. Yeah. Totally. Great question, Gary J. Come on, Gary. And Prisoner 24601, that is Jean Valjean in Les Mis.

That's his prisoner number. Oh, there you go. Which is then referenced on The Simpsons when Principal Skinner is at the fair and he finds his old Vietnam helmet from when he was a prisoner of war and it's prisoner 24601 and he says, oh, he puts it on

that's my old helmet and then he says it's a small world, isn't it? and he says, it really, really is whilst wearing the helmet anyway, good stuff. Good stuff. Next one comes from Logan Husky,

who's got the title of executive producer and authenticity consultant on the Do Go On porn parody, Do Go On and On and On. And Logan's also asking a question, writing, Hey guys, I'm a huge consumer of pop culture and love a great twist in my movies and TV shows. My question is, if you could have the knowledge of a particular plot twist

removed from your memory so you could enjoy it all over again fresh, what would it be? I guess a quick spoiler alert. Let's spoil three things. Yeah, so I guess... Could you repeat that for me, please? Sorry.

So basically, if you could go back and remove a plot twist so you could enjoy a movie or whatever again, what would it be? I was talking about this the other day. Say the title first and then give people a chance to skip forward 30 seconds before you say what the twist is. I guess you don't have to say... We don't have to say what it is.

You don't have to say what the plot twist is. Oh, that's true. Yeah, cool. Because it's not even necessarily, I guess I was talking about this recently, not necessarily just for plot twists, but also just shows I would like to watch for the first time again.

Yes, I'm totally with you. I would love to watch Ted Lasso from, like I would like to wipe that from my brain and just watch it again. Not that there's twists and stuff, but I just loved that show so much and I can't ever have that feeling again. Yeah.

Joy. Yeah, joy is one that you'll never feel. Yeah. The other one for me, if I could wipe from my brain and watch again, would be The Good Place. Oh, yeah. Yeah, there's some good twists and turns in feel. Yeah. The other one for me, if I could wipe from my brain and watch again, would be The Good Place. Oh, yeah. Yeah, there's some good twists

and turns in that. Yeah. Hmm. I would say for me, it would be Agatha Christie's Death on the Nile. Is that the one you ruined for a lot of people?

No, that was the train one. That was the Murder on the Iron Express. Which I watched recently. We're going to go watch... I forgot to tell you, I watched it. Oh, you went and saw the new one? No, I watched the old one. With saw the new one? No I watched the

Old one With David Suchet? No Or with Albert Finney Or the old one As in the one from like Four or five years ago Yeah

Oh sorry The Kenneth Branagh Johnny Depp Yeah Kenneth Branagh Yeah That's the old one Well I didn't know

When it came out Compared to the new Because the new one's Death on the Nile Yeah Which Dave and I Are going to go on a date and watch. Is it out?

Have we missed it? Yeah. No, I think it's out now. Oh, great. Because it is my, that's my favorite David Suchet adaptation. Love that one. And I would love to not know. Yes.

Who. That's good. Yeah. That, their classic question. And what, and how. Yeah. That's nice. I can't, I can't think of any.

I'll tell you what Logan's nice. I can't, I can't think of any. Um, I'll tell you what, um, Logan's written. Yeah. But Logan has gone into the twist. So maybe I'll try and avoid spoiling it. Oh yeah. Uh,

Terminator two, uh, saying by the time I first saw the movie on home video back in the day, it was already such a part of the cultural zeitgeist. Uh, so we'd love to feel the shock of there was a certain moment in a corridor that he would love to see i think it's i think this is the kind of i think it's the kind of spoiler that i haven't seen it and i also didn't know i didn't it was spoiled well before i ever saw it six cents is spoiled i've never seen it i've never

seen exactly the same. Exactly the same. Do you feel like there's no point? Yeah, apparently that's the big, I mean, that's a big part of the movie, right? Yeah. Yeah, I feel like. It'll be incredibly obvious now that I know. What about Shawshank Redemption?

I saw that without knowing a big thing that happens late in the movie. And, you know, I saw that well after it came out. And that was great. I think I watched it at school and that was great i was i think i watched it at school and the rest of the class seemed to already know it was coming like i'm so glad no one mentioned that because that was i was like whoa how good is it to be alive i was exhilarated oh and that's where that catchphrase yes that must have been it uh thanks logan yeah that's a good one but yeah i reckon yeah sh Shawshank Redemption.

I remember that would be fun to enjoy that again for the first time. Finally, from the fact credits and questions, Sophie Shooter, aka Group Mum, bracket, if you finish your homework and tidy your room, you can have a lollipop. Thank you, Mum. Cool. You can have a lollipop. Thank you, Mom.

Cool. There's Sophie Schuder who helps run the snack swap in the Facebook group. Yeah. Sophie's got a fact, which is on the 15th of August 2021 at 8.32 a.m. UK time, it was 17 degrees Celsius in Adelston, Surrey. It was also 17 degrees Celsius in Margate, Kent, Melbourne, Toronto, and Billund in Denmark. I can only assume I was living a boring morning at work because I recently saw the screenshot I took of it to show people. That's right. I'm going for the extra title of most boring fact 2022.

That's kind of cool. I think it's fun. And it's fun that it's one you've just, looks like you've just discovered it by yourself. What was the date? August. August 15. Yeah, 17 degrees.

I guess that's quite a lovely August day. Yeah, we'll take that. In Melbourne? That's pleasant. But at that specific time as well, 8.32 UK time, it'd be evening Melbourne time, wouldn't it? That's a balmy winter evening.

That's a nice spring evening. No, winter evening. Winter, it's August. End of winter. Yeah, which also means in Surrey it was summer. Yeah. But I guess different times of the morning as it's about to heat up or whatever. No, it's probably as hot as a summer day gets.

Thank you, Sophie, for that. I would call fun fact, but I don't have... Well, it's a bit of fun. Oh, thank goodness. And it's nice as well that she saw that at the time and went, oh, it's a bit of fun, and then got to relive that when she found the screenshot and went, oh, you know, that's nice.

Yeah, I think so too. The next thing we'd like to do is thank a few of our great supporters. got to relive that when she found the screenshot and went, oh, you know, that's nice. Yeah. I like that. I think so too. The next thing we'd like to do is thank a few of our great supporters who are on the shout-out level or above. Bob, you normally come up with a bit of a game for this. Yeah, I'm thinking what their, the award that's named after them, what is it for?

Great. Fantastic. Do you mind if I thank a few people first? I'd love that. They're great supporters. I'd love to thank firstly from Greensboro in North Carolina in the United States, Brandy Broyhill. Oh, that's a great name.

BB. What about the... So we're saying the award? Yeah, Brandy Broyhill Award for... The Brandy Broyhill Award for Basketball Dunkery. Oh, nice. That's good. Have you ever dunked a basketball?

Not on a full-size ring, but I've dunked lower rings. On children's playgrounds? No, you know, like, yeah, you know, sort of like big children's playgrounds? Nah, you know, like, yeah, you know, sort of like, look, big children's playgrounds. There was one in our primary school that was screwed into a brick wall, but it was near a ramp, so you could climb up the ramp and then sort of jump over to it.

That's good. Which is pretty fun. And one of my friends, Matt, who listens to this show, he did that once, and the wall came down on top of him and he broke his arm. Oh, my God. I was going to say, it does sound very dangerous when you said it was screwed into a wall.

Yeah, it pulled the bricks down on top of him. Oh, my God. Bit of fun. Thank you very much, Brandy Broyhill. Brandy Broyhill. I must say, there should be a record for North Carolina being mentioned and no follow-up. Why, Dave? We nearly got away with it. That's a very good point Why, Dave? We nearly got away with it.

That's a very good point, Brandy. We nearly got away with it. As Brandy would know, North Carolina, their fire trucks are blue. Apparently, someone messaged me a while ago and I never really corrected, but it's only one small part of North Carolina that has blue fire engines. But still, in... Tell me I'm wrong. Yeah, that's right.

In North Carolina... Did he say in all of North Carolina? Every single fire truck in all of North Carolina? No. So he's not wrong. He's not wrong. If you're in North Carolina, you have the chance to see a blue fire engine. I've definitely said it in a way that implies that it...

Anyway, so thank you very much, Brandy. I'd also love to thank from Claremont in Tasmania, Australia, Daniel Remington. Oh, Daniel Remington. Award for longest moustache hair. Oh, like one singular hair. Single hair. Get the Remington clippers onto it.

Yeah. Or don't, actually. Don't, actually. No, don't. It's a record-holding moustache. Is there prize money with that award? Yeah. How much?

One million dollars. Get the fuck out. Yeah, but the record is like, it's three meters long. Yeah. And the award is actually a big brass hair. It would actually be really hard to, especially if it's one long hair, to not accidentally clip it or just fall out. Yeah, hair's just fall out. Or just trip over it if it's that long. Exactly. Step on it, pull it or just fall out. Hair just fall out.

Or just trip over it if it's that long. Exactly. Step on it, pull it out of your face. Ow! No! Oh, my record. So that's worth a million dollars, I reckon. Thank you very much, Daniel.

And finally for me from Los Angeles, La La Land, as I like to call it, in California, the United States, it's Margot K. The Margot K Award for... Drinking the most milk. Oh, yeah. Wow. I could be up for that, I reckon. You know what you get when you drink milk?

Milk mustache. Oh, that's true. That is true. Margot K, I'm so sorry. Margot K, honestly... First thing that popped in my head was milk. All the way with Margot K. Are we thinking that Margot K was the first person to drink this much milk

and that's why it's named after them? Or did they sponsor the award? Oh, yeah, it's a sponsored award. So it's like Margot's cafe has the milk drinking competition or something? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's great. Thank you so much, Margot, for your support. Jess, do you want to thank a few people?

I would love to. I would love to thank from Plainfield in New Hampshire, I'm guessing? Yeah, I reckon. North Haverbrook. Should I put it on the map? I'd love to thank Dan Dry. Dan Dry. Dan Dry.

The commemorative medal for longest socks. Longest socks. Wow. Wow. The commemorative medal for longest socks. How long are these socks? It's a knitting award. Yeah.

It's a knit off. So the socks have got to be knitted in an allotted amount of time on stage at Dan Dry's barn and restaurant. Barn and restaurant? Barn and restaurant. And then you get a commemorative. And I'll come over. Yeah, you get the Dan Dry commemorative medal

if you've knitted the longest sock. Wow. In 18 seconds. 18 seconds, all you guys. They're speed knitting. They're speeding it. They're speeding it. Because at first you think, wow, the sock's going to be super long. And then you're like, these couldn't even fit a baby.

Because at one point, like, long socks become pants or, like, long johns. You know what I mean? Like, socks can't go on forever if you're wearing them. Because you have other parts of your body unless you got to just scrunch them all the way down but it's scrunched all the way up to your crotch yeah it's fully it's all scrunched so it's just pants yeah but then you pull up those socks young man i can't pull them up any further but then yeah because then you you've got to wear something else to cover your bits another sock long. Long sock in some people's cases.

Red hot chili pepper style. Thank you, Dan. I would also love to thank another one from Claremont in Tasmania. Bloody hell. I wonder if you know each other. And if you don't, hello, new best friend, Jessica Reynolds. Jessica Reynolds. The Jessica Reynolds trophy for highest hat.

My brain didn't let me down this time. Is that tallest hat or the hat is highest? So someone wore it like on a space shuttle or something. They get back from this space exploration and their proudest achievement is just won the highest hat. Just won the Jessica Reynolds. Remember, I have a memory of Googling for a previous Patreon shoutout the tallest hat in the world.

I have a memory of googling for a previous Patreon shout out the tallest hat in the world. And it's a man who has made a 4.8 meter or 15 foot 9 hat. Was that a Patreon bonus episode? That's familiar. A Who Knew It With Matt Stewart episode where it was a world record for tallest hat. Yeah, maybe. No ideas are new ideas anymore. That's really funny funny let's see if we can do better next time this is a quote from guinnessworldrecords.com from odalyn ozer who made the hat 40 year old man hats have always been used to enhance the greatness of

the wearer the taller the hat the greater the wearer. Who is the greatest American? Abraham Lincoln. Why? In part, because of his top hat. Yeah. Can't argue with that. Can't argue with that. The hat is notable. That is a high hat. But move over.

We've got the Jessica Reynolds Award for highest hat. Thank you, Jessica Reynolds. Not to be confused with the Jessica Reynolds award for high hats, which is a drumming award. Finally for me, I would love to thank from Nuremberg in Germany, Anna and Lucas Spath.

Anna and Lucas Spath. The Anna and Lucas Spath award for bravery in the face of no obstacle. Oh, yeah. Wow. Just brave for the sake of it. Just brave.

Just, you know, just doing brave shit. And brave's subjective too, so it's really anyone's game. Yeah. Yeah, well, well done. I mean, Anna and Lucas, all the way in Germany, thank you so much for listening. Two very brave people are here. Well, no, they're a war.

They appreciate brave people. Yeah, they are cowards. Oh, that's why they give out this award, because they admire it in others. Yeah. Dave, bring it home. Bring us some new... Thank some people, would you?

I would love to thank some new people. And I'm looking up... Where are we? Here we go. Sorry, I've lost my tab. I would like to thank from East York in Ontario, Canada, it is Sheila Donaldson-Hartz. Oh, it's so close to Hatz.

Sheila Donaldson-Hartz. Sheila Donaldson-Hartz. Oh, it's so close to hats. Sheila Donaldson-Hartz. Sheila Donaldson-Hartz. The award for happiest dog. Oh. How do you measure this? Well. Tail wag. Sheila's in charge.

Oh, yeah, right. They've probably got some sort of algorithm. Maybe you put them on a scale. Yeah, smile. Yeah. It's a blood test. Yeah, blood test shows how happy they scale. Yeah. Smile. Yeah. It's a blood test. Yeah, blood test shows how happy they are. Yeah, okay.

It's easy. I forget the science. Do this cat scan. Yeah. Sorry, dog scan. Bunsen burner. Look at its brain. It's a happy dog.

Yeah, unfortunately you only know after they die. Yeah. But it's a bit of a, It's a consolation for a grieving family that their dog was very happy. Sheila's killing dogs. To find out how over there. And it keeps opening up the brains going, no, this one was also scared and...

It seems to be begging for its life. I guess the most recent feeling was fear. Oh, my God. That was the most wholesome one but it came to the darkest one. Sheila, thanks so much. I'd like to thank from Beecroft in New South Wales. It is Maddy Boalick.

Maddy Boalick. Great name, Maddy. That's really good. The Maddy Boalick Award for heaviest cow. Oh yeah. And can you put things on the cow to increase its... Or do they have to be in the cow? I would...

Don't put stuff on or in your cow. Okay. Just feed your cow. Okay. Over-feed your cow. Over-feed your cow. So it's in pain. Don't be cruel to the cow.

Over-feed your cow. Don't put like a weight on your cow, you psycho. Just over-feed it so it's uncomfortable. Okay. Hey, thanks so much, Maddie. And finally, from Olympia in Washington in the United States, it is Catherine Conrad. That's a great name, Catherine Conrad.

I love that. Yeah, that sounds like it would start like this. Let's do one where we all say a word in it. The Catherine Conrad Award for Excellence in... a word in it. The Catherine Conrad Award for Excellence in Diving and Snooker.

That's great. The big two. They go hand in hand often. Diving and snooker. I'm not good at things. You were thinking pool. Maybe. Who knows.

Thank you so much to Catherine, Maddie, Sheila, Anna and Lucas Jessica, Dan, Margot Daniel and Brandy I'm showing Matt and Jess a photo I found on Google Images of divers Playing snooker underwater Yeah well they're all vying for the Catherine Conrad

Award for Excellence. And I've taken this from the Guinness World Records page again. The longest marathon snooker underwater relay was 24 hours exactly. Wow. In Germany in 2011. How are those balls staying down? I guess they're heavy, aren't they? Never mind.

Answered my own question. I didn't need you science boffins over there. Balls drop because of the weight, Jess. All right, so the last thing we'd like to do is bring some people into... Not in water, anyway. Point balls. Do they float in water, your balls? You're goddamn right they do.

Huh. Yeah, save me from a few dodgy situations. That was a genuine question I didn't have to ask you I'm sorry So the last thing we'd like to do Is welcome some people Into our Triptych Club This is our club

Where people who have been Sporting on the shout out level Or above For three straight years Get welcomed in It's just the one inductee This week Wow

The way this normally works is I'm standing at the door I've got the door list Only one name on it I'm about to lift The velvet rope, welcome them in. Dave's on stage hyping up the crowd. All the previous inductees are there chanting along with you, cheering along. Dave's also booked a band for the after party.

Dave, who have you got this week? You never know. We've actually got someone you mentioned at the top of the episode, Ravi Shankar. Wow, fantastic. Wow. Looking forward to hearing the stylings of Ravi. And, Bob, you normally come up with a cocktail based on the topic? Yes.

And the cocktail is called the Ravi. Ravi Shanky. Oh, wow. Is that just bottomless? Ravi Shanky. Yes. Ravi Shanky. That's a weird riff on his name.

It's a Ravi Shanky. Yeah. So that he can't sue us. on his name, but... It's a Ravi Shanky. Yeah. So that he can't sue us. Okay. And, yeah, it's delicious. Is there any salmon and cucumber, a.k.a. rocket launchers? No. No, no, no.

The Tribute Club is a safe place. Thank goodness. There will be no need to alert anybody via secret codes. So I'm about to say a name. I'm going to welcome them in. I'm going to welcome them in. Dave's going to hype them up. He's the hype man. He's on the stage.

Yep. He does it with... We can wait for clean water solutions. Or we can engineer access to clean water. We can acknowledge Indigenous cultures. Or we can learn from Indigenous voices. We can demand more from the earth. Or we can demand more from ourselves.

At York University, we work together to create positive change for a better tomorrow. Join us at yorku.ca slash write the future. Sort of really weak puns, but we all support him anyway. And then Jess sort of just boosts

him up from the work that he's done as well which is must I think Jess does the hardest job here trying to be positive about what Dave does but we'll bring him in. Unbelievable.

Every time he tries it's just a pile of steaming dog shit. I was going to say I didn't get to the end of the episode yet from last week but did he just

absolutely suck last week? No, I did them. Oh, okay. That'd have been fine. And he tried to be me and he did okay at being me, I did them. Oh, okay. That would have been fine. And he tried to be me. And he did okay at being me. Okay. But I couldn't hold a flame to you.

I don't know what you two are talking about, but we've got to get on with the triptych inductee. I'm about to read out a name, Dave. Are you ready? Let's talk about this over lunch with Adam later. Yeah. Oh, yeah. All right.

So our one inductee this week is from McKinney in Texas in the United States. It's Alicia Lish Moore. You know what? I thought I'd had enough. I closed the club. I said, we've got enough. Yeah. But then I saw Lish and I said, Moore!

Yeah! Moore! We need you, Lish. Come on in. Yes. Fucking hell. More like McWinnie. Is that McKinney?

Oh, my God. That's good, too. That's good, too. Sounds delish. Shut up, man. So, welcome in, Alicia. Honestly. Lish Moore.

So good to have you in. Make yourselves at home, everyone. And that brings us to the end of the episode. Jess, anything we need to say before we wrap up? Just that we love you. And if you want to suggest a topic, there's a link in the show notes. It's also on our website, dogoonpod.com. So, yeah, like we said before, if there's stories that, you know,

maybe aren't super well known or you think other people would like to hear about, let us know. We'd love to hear them. And also buy tickets to our comedy festival show. Yeah, you can do that. Also at dogoonpod.com. Yeah. Come along.

Do the quiz show on Mondays, but also please come to the live podcast on Sunday. They're always so much fun. We have such a good time at them. We might have some special guests this year. But, yeah, they're a lot of fun in the room, so you'll want to be there. Trust me. That's right. I'll high-five one person each week. That could be you. but yeah they're a lot of fun in the room so you'll want to be there trust me that's right I'll high five

one person each week that could be you and then but David it is still you know COVID time so I will need you to sanitize after that

yeah okay no worries I'll just high five cheers well that brings us to the end of the episode thanks so much for joining us everyone

we will see you next week until then laters bye goodbye joining us everyone we will see you next week until then laters bye