Commonwealth Games’ oldest debutant Robert Pitcairn talks of his heroics during a plane hijack

Seventy-nine-year-old Canadian Robert Pitcairn, a former pilot who once foiled a hijacking attempt, made history on Monday (Apri 9l), becoming the oldest debutant to have competed at the Commonwealth Games. The full bore shooter dedicated himself to the sport after retiring from flying with over 24,000 hours as a commercial and military pilot. He also once stopped a hijacking -- on a flight between Winnipeg and Edmonton. A passenger wielding a knife attacked one of the plane's air hostess and demanded he be flown to Cyprus. “The fellow was a Turkish Cypriot. He'd lost his two brothers in the war in Cyprus and he wanted to go back to make up for his brother's death. Ultimately, I talked him in to going to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and by the time we landed he'd cooled down quite a bit and I was able to talk him out of the hijacking,” recalled Pitcairn (Video credit: SNTV).