One of the biggest tragedies to befall air travel, the Lockerbie bombing, is coming to TV screens as a miniseries. Director Jim Sheridan and fellow filmmaker/daughter Kirsten Sheridanare collaborating on the new show.
The five-part project, written by both Sheridans (and, keeping it in the family, Naomi Sheridan writing one episode), will explore what happened when all 259 passengers and crew were killed when a bomb blew up Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie 38 minutes after take-off in 1988, with a further 11 residents losing their life as the plane came down over the quiet, Scottish town. Thirteen years later, in 2001, Libyan national Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was convicted of the crime and later released on compassionate grounds in 2009.
Shortly after the Lockerbie bombing, families of the victims joined together to launch a campaign for truth and justice. Among them was Dr. Jim Swire, whose campaign has taken him to the sand dunes of Libya to meet face-to-face with Colonel Gaddafi, to 10 Downing Street to meet with successive Prime Ministers and to the corridors of power in the US where he worked with the American victims’ groups to mount pressure on Washington for tighter airport security, well before 9/11.
The series will follow events from 1988 to the present day, while providing an intimate account of a man, a husband, and a father who pushes his marriage, his health, and his sanity to the edge. It's adapted from Swire's book, which he wrote with Peter Biddulph.
"The bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 was one of the world’s deadliest terror attacks that continues to have widespread implications for the meaning of justice in the US, Scotland and Libya," say the Sheridans in a statement. "Over 30 years on, this series takes an intimate and very personal look at the aftermath of the disaster, and we are grateful to all of those, particularly Jim and Jane, who have entrusted us to tell their story, and the story of their loved ones, on screen.”
With cameras scheduled to role later this year, the miniseries should be on UK screens next year via Sky, with Peacock carrying it in the States.