Flight 182, en route from Montreal to London and on to Delhi, exploded at 31,000 feet off the Irish coast after a bomb hidden in checked luggage detonated. All 329 passengers and crew died, most of them Canadian citizens of Indian origin. Investigators linked the bombing to Sikh separatist militants seeking retaliation for the Indian government's 1984 raid on the Golden Temple.
Just before dawn over the Atlantic, Air India Flight 182 broke apart in midair and plunged into the sea near Cahersiveen, Ireland, killing everyone aboard instantly. Fishermen and Irish naval vessels found wreckage and bodies scattered across miles of ocean; only 132 bodies were ever recovered.
The bomb had been checked as luggage in Vancouver on a connecting flight, timed with chilling precision, another device exploded prematurely at Tokyo's Narita Airport within the same hour, killing two baggage handlers, evidence the same plot targeted a second Air India flight. Investigators traced both bombs to Sikh militants avenging the Indian Army's June 1984 storming of the Golden Temple in Amritsar, an operation that had killed hundreds of Sikh pilgrims and militants alike.
The case became Canada's longest and most expensive criminal investigation, spanning two decades and costing over 100 million dollars, yet only one man was ever convicted, for manslaughter related to building the bomb. Two others were acquitted in a 2005 trial that devastated victims' families. A 2010 public inquiry concluded Canadian intelligence and police failures had allowed preventable warning signs to slip through, a bitter footnote to a tragedy that for years was Canada's largest mass murder.
Key people: Talwinder Singh Parmar