1979: Dunedin Airport Siege

December 19, 2023

By AHNZ

Today in New Zealand history, 19 December, 1979, the control tower at Dunedin Airport was under siege. Forty police had surrounded the area between 6am and 11am when the hostage situation was handled peacefully followed by a violent reprisal by police against the teens responsible.

Murray Sharp, 18yo, was the young brains behind the siege. With 3 other young men he escaped youth prison in Invercargill and used stolen cars and petrol to drive overnight to Dunedin. Conspicuous, the youths were soon confronted by local police and detained. Sharp turned the tables by producing a stolen gun and detaining 4 policemen!

Sharp and his accomplice, Ox, had been abandoned by their 2 fellow escapees who made off with the car to be caught later.  Ox was ‘cracked hard over the head’ by a police baton according to Stuff (2020) or “hurt himself when he stumbled” as police appear to have told the Press (1979) on the day. Despite this the pair managed to get the better of the 4 cops.

Taking Constable Dave McMillan hostage in one of the police cars the escapees drove around Dunedin with a trail of cautious pursuers. Sharp then determined to steal a plane and escape to Australia! At the airport this proved less simple than in the movies so the group broke into the control tower, acquiring another 2 hostages, and the siege was on!

McMillan, in particular, used Emotional Intelligence to connect with the youth and deescalate the situation. Meanwhile the siege cops had cranked the heating in the tower up to the max in an attempt to make everyone in it irritable and drowsy. The tower staff were released in return for breakfast however the John Davis, air traffic controller John Davis, refused to leave his post.

Both Sharp and McMillan were traumatised by the ordeal, amygdalas primed for anxiety in confined spaces. Perhaps John Davis had also been inflicted with the same claustrophobia? Not a condition he could afford to go untreated in his line of work.¹

Davis told the Press that “Once I had spoken to the two blokes who came up with the constable, it was quite obvious their intention was not to harm us in any event, though they did have a gun.” He praised McMillan for keeping cool and calm and acknowledge that Sharp was behaving as decently as he could in the situation. It got to the point that the only thing prolonging the situation was Sharp and Ox’s correct prediction that even peaceful surrender would be followed by a revenge beating by police.

“The police arrested two of the youths at Momona Airport, and the other two at a Dunedin shopping mall. The only injury was to one of the youths, who hurt himself when he stumbled.” – Press (1979,) Papers Past

“Given the circumstances. I was reasonably happy,” Mr Davis said. “The constable was quite calm about the whole thing…When it [shotgun] was accidentally pointed in our direction we reminded them and they averted the barrels…The tension eased quite a bit when the gun changed hands,” Mr Davis said. “The police constable handled things very calmly. He talked to the youths quite a lot and helped them out and helped them make their decision,” – ibid

“The 23-year-old constable should have finished his shift an hour earlier, but instead he was going to drive Sharp and fellow escapee Terry Taituha anywhere but here…He was 16, powerfully-built and angry. Another cop had cracked him over the head with his baton and opened up a nasty head wound. McMillan didn’t say it, but he was relieved Taituha wasn’t the one with the gun.” – The teens who took the tower: The remarkable Dunedin Airport hostage siege of 1979, Stuff (2020)

“Sharp and Taituha were set on by police dogs as they were arrested. That annoyed McMillan. He’d assured the young men they’d be safe if they gave themselves up. When he protested, one of the dog handlers looked at him. “This is not just about you Dave,” he said, “This is about every cop in New Zealand.”” – ibid

There was no practical reason to brutalise Terry ‘Ox’ Taituha and Murray Sharp. They had surrendered and the situation was now totally under control.

McMillian believes the wounded and angry Ox would have killed him and perhaps other police if he had the gun. He says it was Sharp that stopped things going that way and he saved lives that day.

All the same, the police beat them both and had their attack dogs bite them in order to assert dominance. Even Constable McMillan was annoyed at this display of violence and he had given his word it wouldn’t be like this. His protests were silenced by the attack dog guy who pointed out “This is about every cop in New Zealand.” The warning coloration, stripes, flashing lights, and wailing sirens of the New Zealand Police are supposed to act on the trauma part of the citizen’s brain. Police don’t control the population by Emotional Intelligence but by acting on the Reptilian Brain that causes us to Fight/Flight/Freeze/Fawn. Ironically, being abused this way is exactly what led Sharp and his escapees into delinquency and then crime in all along. Rather than reform there would be, of course, more prison and crime in Sharp’s future². McMillan processed the reality of this situation in the usual 1970s male Kiwi way:  “went out with a mate and got very drunk.”

—
1. A John Davis in the 2010s was Team Leader of Christchurch Airport Tower. If the same man then he may be the only one who didn’t suffer from claustrophobia. Ref. Stuff (2009)

2. Ref. Men at centre of Dunedin Airport hostage siege reunite, Stuff (2020)

Image ref. Errol Holland (1962,) Hocken Collections, Facebook (2023.) Cropped AHNZ

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