Originally published in Jetstream Magazine by Sanghyun Kim.

The hum of engines echoed through Baghdad’s Saddam International Airport as families waved goodbye under the harsh fluorescent lights. Among the 99 passengers boarding Korean Air Flight 858 that morning in 1987, few could imagine their journey would end as one of aviation’s darkest mysteries.

November 29, 1987, started as any other travel day for passengers at Saddam International Airport (now Baghdad International Airport) in Baghdad, Iraq. At the gate, 99 passengers were boarding Korean Air Flight 858, a journey bound for Seoul, South Korea, with scheduled stops in Abu Dhabi, UAE, and Bangkok, Thailand. 

Of the 99 passengers and 20 crew on this 16-year-old Boeing 707, most were Koreans returning home from work overseas, including 55 employees of the Hyundai construction and engineering company. Other notable passengers included Seoul’s consul general in Baghdad and his wife, two Japanese nationals who were father and daughter, an Indian national, and a Lebanese national.

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