British group Oasis misbehave on Australia flight
     SYDNEY, Australia -- Feb 25, 1998 2:11 a.m. EST -- British rock
 band Oasis lived up to its reputation as the bad boys of rock by
 smoking, swearing and throwing objects at staff and passengers dur-
 ing a flight from Hong Kong to Perth in Western Australia, an
 Australia newspaper reported.
    Passenger Julie Dawkins said Liam Gallagher and his band shouted,
 used foul language and intimidated staff and passengers in business
 class during the seven-and-a-half hour flight late on Tuesday.
     "They threw a newspaper at me and they threw a hand towel at my
 husband," Dawkins was quoted as saying in Wednesday's edition of The
 Australian newspaper.
     Dawkins described lead singer Liam Gallagher as the "loudest,
 foulest and most obnoxious" and said the flight's captain confronted
 the band when members of the entourage began smoking in the cabin.
     "I don't know what they were smoking, but I'm sure it wasn't
 cigarettes," Dawkins said.
     Cathay Pacific spokesman Ken Morton said numerous complaints
 had been received from fellow passengers about the behaviour of the
 band members, who were said to be drunk.
     "We'd certainly want a guarantee of adult behaviour before we
 allowed them back," the Australia quoted Morton as saying.
     Gallagher, renowned for his fiery spirit and drug use, said in
 a magazine interview in January he was ready to settle down and have
 children with his wife, actress Patsy Kensit.
     The band is often compared with the Beatles, some of whose mem-
 bers have criticised Gallagher and Oasis for their behaviour.
     Oasis will perform in five concerts during their stay in
 Australia.
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                 Skies a bit friendlier in '97
    WASHINGTON - Feb 24, 1998 5:48 p.m. EST - Major U.S. air carriers
 recorded one of their safest years on record in 1997, with three
 fatalities, a sharp drop from the 342 lost lives the previous year,
 the National Transportation Safety Board.
     However, the nation's smaller airlines recorded 46 fatalities
 last year, up from 14 in 1996.
     While there was a drop in deaths on major carriers, the total
 number of accidents increased to 42, up 10, at least partly as a
 result of a definition change under which more aircraft were class-
 ified as major carriers.
     The major carriers' three deaths, including two passengers, is
 the fewest since 1993, when there was just one airline fatality and
 that was not a passenger.
     The difference between 1996 and 1997 illustrated the volatility
 of statistics in a business where even one accident can claim hun-
 dreds of lives.
     The three who died last year were a Continental Airlines passen-
 ger who fell through an open catering door while boarding the plane
 in Lima, Peru; a United Airlines passenger killed when the aircraft
 encountered sharp turbulence over the Pacific Ocean, and a Delta Air
 Lines ground crew member run over by a plane's nosewheel at
 LaGuardia Airport in New York City.
     The NTSB did not provide their names.
     There were five fatal accidents involving smaller carriers last
 year, the worst on Jan. 9 when 29 people died in a Comair crash at
 Monroe, Mich. If that crash had occurred after March, it would have
 fallen into the major airline category.
     Other smaller airline fatalities in 1997, which all involved the
 smaller aircraft, included eight killed on Nov. 8 in a Hageland Avi-
 ation Services crash in Barrow, Alaska; five deaths on another Hage-
 land flight April 10 in Wainwright, Alaska, and two deaths each on
 an Air Sunshine crash Feb. 8 in the Virgin Islands and an Olson Air
 Service accident June 27 in Nome, Alaska.
    The report also showed 40 deaths in 82 accidents last year on air
 taxis, which are not included in the statistics for scheduled air-
 lines. The 40 deaths were down from 63 fatalities a year earlier.
     Private planes, meanwhile, recorded 646 fatalities in 1997, up
 slightly from 631 a year earlier.
 --------------------------------------------------------------------
       Turkish Airlines hijacker overcome by fellow passengers
      ANKARA, Turkey - Feb 25, 1998 02:24 a.m. EST - A hijacker pro-
 claiming himself on a mission from God seized a Turkish Airlines jet
 Tuesday and demanded to be flown to Iran, only to be tackled by
 fellow passengers, Turkey's Anatolia news agency reported.
     After pummeling him, passengers handed the man over to security
 forces, Turkish television reported. There were no injuries to any of
 the 62 passengers or five crew members.
     "I am a martyr of God," the hijacker, identified as 31-year-old
 Mehmet Dal, shouted as security troops took him from the plane early
 Wednesday.
     The hijacking started Tuesday night, when a man claiming to have
 a bomb stuffed in a teddy bear commandeered the plane shortly after
 it took off from the southern city of Adana on Tuesday.
     The flight was initially bound for the Turkish capital, Ankara,
 about 250 miles to the northwest.
     The hijacker released 21 of the passengers after landing in the
 southeastern city of Diyarbakir. Authorities refused to refuel the
 plane to let it fly on to the Iranian capital, Tehran.
     Passenger Vedat Gulsen said the hijacker was acting to protest
 what he called the oppression of Muslims in Algeria. He ordered the
 crew not to serve any alcohol, which is forbidden under Islam.
     The hijacker also demanded cigars and food. Seeing a chance to
 end the standoff, security forces prepared to enter the plane
 dressed as caterers to deliver the meals and tobacco.
     But passengers acted before security officers did.
     "I jumped over him and started to punch his face, when two other
 passengers grabbed and threw him on the floor," Gulsen told ATV
 television.
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