Fliegerbauer was born in Westerndorf, Lower Bavaria and grew up on a farm with his two siblings. He originally attended Agricultural school before taking up an apprenticeship with the Bavarian State Police. Fliegerbauer was appointed as police officer of the Municipial Police Munich to the rank "Polizeiobermeister" on 19 November 1970. In 1964 he met his future wife who he then married in 1966 and two years later they had a son, Alfred. During the 1972 Munich Olympic Games, Fliegerbauer was assigned to a riot police unit.
Death
On 5 September Fliegerbauer's unit was ordered to Fürstenfeldbruck Air Base, where the WestGerman Police had planned to rescue the nine Israeli hostages taken by eight Black September terrorists. Fliegerbauer took position inside the airport building at the base of the control tower directly opposite where the two Bell UH-1 Iroquois carrying the Israeli hostages and terrorists landed. Upon discovering that the Lufthansa plane had no crew and suspecting a trap, terrorist leader 'Issa' and his deputy 'Tony' ran back towards the two helicopters, shouting as they did so to the terrorists at the helicopters. Three West German Police marksmen stationed on the roof of the control opened fire on the six terrorists at outside the two helicopters and at least one on Afif and Nazzal still moving back towards the helicopters. As they did so, Fliegerbauer, still positioned inside the airport building at the base of the control tower, also opened fire on the terrorist leader and his deputy with a submachine gun. According to Simon Reeve, author of One Day in September, Fliegerbauer had fired less than half the bullets in his magazine when a random shot from the one of the Black September terrorists came through the window and struck him in the side of the head. In a chapter entitled "Death at the Munich Olympics," Kay Schiller, professor of cultural history at Durham University, writes that Fliegerbauer was celebrated as a "hero who had paid the ultimate price in his attempt to liberate innocent hostages," and argues that this made it easier for the German public to "cope with the death of the Israelis," despite the fact that it was clear that the response of German security had been incompetent.
Memorials
Fliegerbauer was buried on 8 September after a "well attended" civic funeral attended by the Mayor of MunichGeorg Kronawitter and Prime Minister of BavariaAlfons Goppel with wreaths laid on behalf of West German ChancellorWilly Brandt and West German PresidentGustav Heinemann. In a memorial service held at Fürstenfeldbruck Air Base in 2012, commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Munich massacre, Fliegerbauer was remembered alongside the eleven members of the Israeli delegation slain by the terrorists. During 2016 Fliegerbauer was memorialized at the Olympic Village in Brazil. On the memorial to the massacre erected at Olympiapark, Fliegerbauer is described in a sentence that reads, "The police failed in this attempt, and the operation ended in disaster. All of the hostages and the German police officer Anton Fliegerbauer, as well as five of the terrorists, died."
