• November 28, 1977
• Vol. 8
• No. 22

When Skyjackers Strike or Commandos Retaliate, Michael Gurdus of Israel Is All Ears

By Robert Nobel

No sooner had terrorists seized control of Lufthansa flight 181 from Majorca last month than 33-year-old Michael Gurdus began leafing through his dog-eared files of radio frequencies. Within moments the young Israeli journalist was monitoring all communications with the hijacked jet, and for the next five days—until the daring commando raid at Mogadishu airport—the Tel Aviv apartment he shares with his wife, Yardena, became the principal listening post for an anxious world. Juggling transmissions on three of his seven high-powered receivers, Gurdus tracked the Lufthansa jet from Spain to Somalia, while simultaneously monitoring flights carrying pursuing commandos and a West German negotiator. As two German journalists took turns translating, Gurdus stayed by his equipment day and night, catnapping on a cot amid jangling telephones. "I think," he says, "that I talked to every radio and TV station in the Western world."

His diligence, in fact, came breath-takingly close to foiling the rescue operation. After intercepting a message that he interpreted as an order for the commandos to strike, Gurdus taped a report for Israeli television which he assumed would be broadcast after the raid had taken place. But the operation was delayed, and the tape was shown before the commandos could act. Fortunately, the terrorists did not get the message. "Next time," he vows, "I will withhold the information no matter how big a scoop it is. As an Israeli I am particularly aware of what could have happened."

Fluent in Arabic, English, French, Russian and Polish, as well as his native Hebrew, Gurdus is following in the journalistic footsteps of his late father, who started monitoring broadcasts from Eastern Europe more than 40 years ago to compensate for being confined to a wheelchair. Young Gurdus obtained his first professional radio receiver at 16 and immediately began compiling an exhaustive list of broadcast frequencies, including those of all the world's airlines (plus Air Force One). "This is my career," says Gurdus. "What I have on these cards is a lot more valuable than my equipment."

Gurdus' most dramatic success occurred in 1974, when President Makarios of Cyprus was temporarily ousted in a coup. Even as Radio Nicosia was announcing the president's death, Gurdus recorded a faint call for help from Makarios in the small town of Paphos. Gurdus released the broadcast, and Makarios was rescued. Years later he credited Gurdus with saving his life. The Israeli was pleased but hardly in need of encouragement. "You can only spend this many hours at something," he says, "if you are really crazy about it to begin with."