Bombay Boy Eddie Recounts The Horror Of Munich Olympics Massacre ‘72

Woken up at dawn on September 5 by the unusual clatter around his block at the Olympic Village in Munich in 1972, India’s expert runner in the half-mile, metric mile and over 5000 metres was terrified and scared by the goings-on at the block across, where the Israeli contingent was put up. It was on September 6 though that the famous Eddie Sequeira from Sanata Cruz, Mumbai came to know that the Palestinian ‘Black September’ group had invaded the Olympic Village, killed two Israeli delegates, and held nine more as hostages, all of them later killed around midnight at a nearby airport. The carnage sent shock waves across the world. “I was terrified and scared by what I saw on September 5. They were in red track suit, black bags, mask and hood. Myself and Sriram Singh were occupying a room in a ground floor block. And the Israel team was across our Block, about 100 metres away. At 4.21 am or thereabout, there was a lot of noise, and I saw people running away. I awoke Sriram immediately. It was not very dark, but a light morning. We made sure our door latch was on. Later in the morning we were told that the events for the day have been cancelled. The fright was there in my mind, but I managed to clock my personal best in the 5000 m run.”