U.S. Told Pan Am, Envoys of Threat, Not Passengers : Terrorists Suspected in 281 Deaths; Black Boxes Found

WASHINGTON — The State Department warned U.S. embassies that a bomb threat had been made against Pan Am jetliners flying from Frankfurt, West Germany, to the United States 2 1/2 weeks before the crash of a New York-bound flight originating in Germany, U.S. officials said today.

In addition, a Pan American World Airways official said the Federal Aviation Administration told the airline early this month that Pan Am might be the target of a terrorist bombing on a route from Frankfurt.

Pan Am Flight 103 crashed Wednesday in Scotland, killing all 259 people aboard--most of them Americans returning home for Christmas--and at least 22 villagers on the ground, with 17 people unaccounted for.

U.S. and British officials said the plane probably exploded before the crash.

David Kyd, spokesman for the International Air Transport Assn., agreed that sabotage was the most likely cause. “Aircraft just don’t disappear when they are cruising at 30,000 feet,” he said in Geneva.

Kyd said the parallel was striking between Wednesday’s crash and a 1985 incident in which an Air India 747 plunged into the sea off Ireland, also apparently after an explosion. All 329 aboard died in that disaster.

An investigating team decided that the Air India flight had most likely been sabotaged by use of an explosive-packed suitcase.

British Transport Secretary Paul Channon announced that the plane’s flight data and cockpit voice recorders had been found.

In London today, an anonymous caller to the Associated Press office claimed responsibility for the crash of Flight 103 and said it was in retaliation for the downing of an Iran Air Airbus by the U.S. Navy cruiser Vincennes in July.

Islamic ‘Guardians’

“We, the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution, are undertaking this heroic execution in revenge of blowing up the Iran airplane by America a few months ago and keeping the Shah’s family in America. We are very proud,” the male caller said, and then hung up. The Navy said the Iranian plane carrying 290 people over the Persian Gulf was mistaken for an Iranian fighter.

Wednesday’s doomed Flight 103 originated in Frankfurt with a Boeing 727. Passengers and luggage were transferred to the 747 at London’s Heathrow Airport.

White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater defended the State Department notification of the embassies and embassy personnel, but he acknowledged that the “public should be aware of the general threat” as well.

“I think that certainly will be looked at,” Fitzwater told reporters. “Public notification has to be considered.”

Asked why there was none in this case, he said: “I don’t have an answer on that. . . . The issue is, there are so many of these (threats) that this was determined to be the appropriate level of notification.”

He said President Reagan was “deeply saddened” by the crash.

State Department spokeswoman Phyllis Oakley said that on Dec. 5, an unidentified caller told the U.S. Embassy in Helsinki that sometime within the next two weeks “an unidentified person in Helsinki would unwittingly take the device to Frankfurt and eventually onto the U.S.-bound flight.”

“Pan Am had received notification from various sources that there was the possibility of a threat against Pan American Airways,” said Pan Am spokeswoman Pam Hanlon in New York. “We immediately acted and put supplementary security procedures in effect, not only at Frankfurt but at airports around the world.” She declined to say what steps were taken.

Hanlon said added precautions were taken at London and all other major airports, with some given higher priority, but she declined to say which airports were considered at most serious risk.

She confirmed that one of the warnings came from the FAA in the form of a memo but said “for security reasons we do not circulate them publicly.”

The village of Lockerbie, Scotland, woke up today to a nightmare that would not go away. Corpses were strewn on a golf course and children played beside twisted wreckage from the crash of Flight 103.

Residents talked of “whooshing” noises and tremendous flames as the stricken Boeing 747 jumbo jet roared low overhead, spewing pieces over the rolling countryside and finally crashing in fragments across their streets and houses Wednesday evening.

“It is beyond one’s comprehension,” said Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who toured the village with Prince Andrew, the Duke of York. “It is beyond one’s imagination. . . . You have to come here to see it and to realize.”

A long, deep crater formed a black scar along a row of houses. Other homes, drenched in flaming aviation fuel, were gutted.

Survivors comforted each other, felt lucky to be alive and tried to clean up some of the mess in the town of 2,500 people.

Scorched pillows, life jackets and fragments of clothing lay scattered in gardens. Chunks of metal, some as small as coins and others two feet in diameter, had sliced through roofs and shattered windows in homes and cars.

Charred money, a mud-spattered seat belt and tattered copies of the Pan Am magazine added to the melancholy scene.

Lockerbie’s town hall became a makeshift morgue as firefighters recovered remains strewn about. Eight bodies lay on a neighboring golf course.