On 21 December 1988, a cowardly act of terrorism blew PanAm's Clipper Maid of the Seas out of the sky over Scotland. Flight PA103, en route from London to New York, carried 259 men, women and children, their bags heavy with Christmas presents for those awaiting their homecoming. As the blazing wreckage fell on Lockerbie, it claimed the lives of 11 residents, bringing the death toll to 270 people.
The town of Lockerbie later shipped 270 blocks of locally quarried sandstone to America. Each block of the distinctive reddish stone represented a life lost in the disaster. The task of building these blocks into a memorial was undertaken by Frank Klein. A builder from New Jersey, whose daughter Patricia had been on PA103, Frank moved to Washington DC with some of his workers, and over several months lovingly erected the cairn that now stands in a secluded part of Section 1 in Arlington National Cemetery.
The Lockerbie Memorial Cairn was unveiled by Bill Clinton, the President of the United States. Among those attending the ceremony were the families of those killed, residents of Lockerbie, American and Scottish police officers, and many more for whom the horrors of those dark December days in Scotland will never fade.
In a quiet corner of Lockerbie's cemetery is a Garden of Remembrance. It is lovingly tended by local people, who have adopted those victims buried there, vowing always to visit the graves on behalf of their families. 3000 miles away, relatives gather every December at Arlington, where the names of their loved ones are engraved into the marble base of the Lockerbie Memorial Cairn - a unique and powerful tribute to such a devastating loss.
The cairn is located at Arlington, Humphreys dr. behind the Arlington house, Robert E Lee memorial.



The Lockerbie Cairn, through its 270 blocks of red Scottish sandstone, memorializes the 270 lives lost in the terrorist attack on the United States when Pan Am flight 103 was bombed Dec. 21, 1988, over Lockerbie Scotland. It is a gift of the people of Scotland to the people of the United States, financed entirely through private donations. The ill-fated flight was enroute from Frankfurt, Germany, to New York via London's Heathrow Airport. Twenty-seven minutes after leaving London, at 7:02 p.m. the plane exploded, raining fragments on the city of Lockerbie, including an entire wing and engines. Eleven of the 270 dead were on the ground. The passengers and crew included people from 22 countries. Among them were 189 Americans, including 15 active-duty military and 10 veterans.
Senate Joint Resolution 129 designating Arlington National Cemetery as the site of the Cairn was unanimously passed by Congress and signed into law by President Clinton in November, 1993.
The blocks of standstone come from Corsehill Quarry of Annan, Scotland, about eight miles southeast of Lockerbie and in the flight path of Flight 103. Corsehill Quarry, operating since 1820, has acquired a world-wide reputation for producing sandstone of superb quality. Stones from this quarry are used in many buildings in the United States including, most notably, the base stones of the Statue of Liberty.
A traditional Scottish monument form, a cairn can be an informal heap of stones or may take a more orderly mortared construction. In this instance, the 270 stones are mortared into a short tower-like circular form measuring approximately seven feet across at the base and tapering to a height of about 10 and a half feet.
The Memorial Cairn is being erected in Arlington National Cemetery in memory of the 270 lives lost in the One hundred and eighty-nine were Americans, including 15 active duties military and 10 veterans.
In May 1999, following intense international pressure including imposition of economic sanctions and personal diplomacy by South African and Saudi Arabian leaders, Libya consented to the trial of two of its citizens in the Netherlands before a Scottish court and handed over the suspects to United Nations personnel. Following a 40-week trial, a verdict of guilty for murder was returned Jan. 31, 2001, against Abdel Baset Ali Mohamed al-Megrahi while Al-Amin Khalifa Fhimah was acquitted. The three-judge panel found beyond a reasonable doubt that Al-Megrahi placed a bomb in the airplane and that bomb's detonation caused the deaths of all aboard the plane. The panel found that the prosecution failed to prove the case against Fhimah beyond a reasonable doubt. The guilty verdict for which life imprisonment with chance of parol after 20 years has been appealed.


PAN AM FLIGHT 103 MEMORIAL CAIRN — LOCKERBIE CAIRN
The following words also are engraved on the base:
On 21 December 1988, a terrorist bomb destroyed
Pan American Airlines Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland,
killing all on board and 11 on the ground.
The 270 Scottish stones which compose this memorial cairn
commemorate those who lost their lives in
this attack against America.
A bronze plaque on the side of the cairn states:
IN REMEMBRANCE OF
THE TWO HUNDRED SEVENTY
PEOPLE KILLED IN THE
TERRORIST BOMBING OF
PAN AMERICAN AIRWAYS
FLIGHT 103 OVER LOCKERBIE,
SCOTLAND
21 DECEMBER 1988
PRESENTED BY
THE LOCKERBIE AIR DISASTER TRUST
TO THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

PAN AM FLIGHT 103 MEMORIAL CAIRN — LOCKERBIE CAIRN
The following words also are engraved on the base:
On 21 December 1988, a terrorist bomb destroyed
Pan American Airlines Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland,
killing all on board and 11 on the ground.
The 270 Scottish stones which compose this memorial cairn
commemorate those who lost their lives in
this attack against America.
A bronze plaque on the side of the cairn states:
IN REMEMBRANCE OF
THE TWO HUNDRED SEVENTY
PEOPLE KILLED IN THE
TERRORIST BOMBING OF
PAN AMERICAN AIRWAYS
FLIGHT 103 OVER LOCKERBIE,
SCOTLAND
21 DECEMBER 1988