Real-life Libya skyjack stalls Malta airport film shooting on hijack

Film premised on four-decade old Uganda hostage crisis

As hijackers forced a plane to land in Malta on Friday, they had no idea they would be disrupting another 'hijack'.

The Airbus A320 had been on an domestic flight in Libya when it was diverted to Malta, 500 kms (300 miles) north of the Libyan coast, after a man told the crew he had a grenade.



The hijackers later surrendered and freed all hostages, oblivious to the  fact that the situation had interrupted the shooting of a plane hijack film. Entebbe film crew had to terminate filming on airport grounds after the Afriqiyah Airways plane landed at Malta International Airport.

"It's very ironic because then there was the real hijack on," Magda Magri Naudi, the mayor of Lija, said. The film is premised on the Uganda hostage crisis that unfolded four decades ago.

"We've had five hijackings landing here and ironically today they were actually filming Entebbe on the airport grounds - and that had to be stopped," Naudi told BBC.



However, unlike the decades-old hijacking the two hijackers of the Libyan aircraft submitted themselves to police.

In a daring 1976 raid, Israeli forces freed over a 100 passengers held hostage  at Uganda's Entebbe airport.

This article originally appeared on BBC.