Escape from Sarir

In 1979, The Libyan government contracted an American agricultural company to establish a potato and onion farm, four hundred miles south of Benghazi, in the Sahara. The political and economic tensions in the region were at an explosive level. Iran, a close neighbor and ally, had just overrun the United States Embassy in Tehran and taken fifty-two U.S. diplomats hostage. The Arab world saw Iran’s show of strength as an ensign for the end of foreign tyranny, a symbol of hope for the new power in the Middle East. The distain and resentment for all things American escalated rapidly. It was at this time that Derek Thayne, an eighteen-year-old farm boy from a very small town in Oregon, accepted a contract work assignment in Libya. He had no previous international or even big city experience. He naively boarded a TWA jumbo jet for the Middle East and promptly found himself in the adventure of a lifetime. The story portrayed in this book is based on a series of actual events during this turbulent time.