more than a month, while the Federal Criminal Police Office carried out its biggest investigation to date. Matters escalated when, on 13 October 1977, Lufthansa Flight 181 from Palma de Mallorca to Frankfurt was hijacked. A group of four PFLP members took control of the plane (which was named Landshut). The leader introduced himself to the passengers as "Captain Mahmud", who was later identified as . When the plane landed in Rome for refueling, he issued the same demands as the Schleyer kidnappers, plus the release of two Palestinians held in Turkey and payment of US$15 million. The Bonn crisis team again decided not to give in. The plane flew on via Larnaca, then Dubai, and then to Aden, where flight captain Jürgen Schumann, whom the hijackers deemed not cooperative enough, was brought before an improvised "revolutionary tribunal" and murdered on 16 October. His body was dumped on the runway. The aircraft again took off, flown by the co-pilot Jürgen Vietor, this time headed for Mogadishu, Somalia. A high-risk rescue operation was led by Hans-Jürgen Wischnewski, then undersecretary in the chancellor's office, who had been secretly flown in from Bonn. At five past midnight CET on 18 October, the plane was stormed in a seven-minute assault by GSG 9, an elite unit of the German federal police. All four hijackers were shot; three of them died on the spot. None of the passengers were seriously hurt and Wischnewski was able to phone Schmidt and tell the Bonn crisis team that the operation had been a success. "Stammheim Death Night" After the conclusion of the Landshut hostage crisis was announced in the late evening of 17 October, all the RAF members incarcerated in Stammheim committed suicide during the following night. Their lawyer, Arndt Müller, had smuggled pistols into the prison. Andreas Baader and Jan-Carl Raspe shot themselves with these weapons while Gudrun Ensslin hanged herself. Irmgard Möller tried to kill herself with a knife, but survived severely injured. The suicides went unnoticed until early next morning. Doctors were rushed in. Baader and Ensslin were already dead when found. Raspe was still alive and moved to the hospital where he died soon after. Möller recovered after being brought to a hospital. The suicide of the imprisoned RAF leadership led to a significant media echo. The coordinated attempt sparked numerous conspiracy theories. It was alleged that the RAF members did not kill themselves,