ع
Bomb threats targeted seven flights across Europe on Tuesday with aircraft bound for airports in Poland, Spain, Italy and Bulgaria diverted or met by emergency teams upon landing, according to reports compiled by Reuters and the BBC. The UK government described the alerts affecting departures from London Heathrow and Manchester as malicious hoaxes while noting that the country’s aviation security processes had responded effectively. Polish, Spanish, Italian and Bulgarian officials all reported that searches of the planes found no devices or explosives, Reuters dispatches stated. A Reuters analysis quoted aviation risk expert Rhys Jones of Osprey Flight Solutions describing seven confirmed threats in a single day as exceptional and pointing to general disruption of aviation operations as the likely aim.
The UK government said in a statement that its world-leading police and intelligence agencies work closely every day to keep citizens safe using the tools they have to assess and respond to potential threats as well as malicious hoax threats like those seen on Tuesday. A LOT Polish Airlines flight from London Heathrow carrying 181 people was diverted to Warsaw’s Modlin Airport instead of the intended Chopin facility after the threat was received in flight, a Warsaw Modlin Airport spokesperson told Reuters. The airport closed briefly during the security operation but reopened after no device was located, according to the same official.
A Ryanair flight from Manchester to Murcia in Spain landed safely before passengers disembarked and the aircraft underwent inspection by a bomb squad, local authorities informed multiple outlets including the BBC. The Manchester flight formed part of the same wave of alerts that included two Ryanair services landing at Rome’s Fiumicino Airport, one from Lisbon and one from Dublin, sources at the Italian airport told Reuters. The Dublin-to-Rome plane was escorted by Italian Air Force jets during its final approach, airport operator ADR reported.
Bulgaria’s transport ministry told Reuters that separate threats had been made against a Wizz Air flight from Bergamo in Italy to Sofia and a Ryanair flight from Dublin to the Bulgarian capital, with both aircraft landing safely and no explosives discovered during subsequent checks. An SAS flight from Copenhagen to Warsaw Chopin Airport also received a threat but landed on schedule before being searched, a Chopin Airport spokesperson confirmed to news agencies. Bulgarian interior ministry officials separately briefed local media that counter-terrorism units had carried out the inspections at Sofia.
The Tuesday incidents followed a similar alert on Monday that forced a Wizz Air flight from London Luton to Sofia to divert to Budapest where Hungarian fighter jets provided an escort before a security sweep found nothing, Hungarian Defence Minister Romulusz Ruszin-Szendi stated on social media. Two weeks earlier an Austrian Airlines flight from Tel Aviv to Vienna had been diverted to Sofia after receiving a bomb threat that also proved false, Reuters records show. The pattern of repeated alerts in recent weeks has not been linked by any authority to a single source or perpetrator.
No airline involved issued immediate public comment on the threats beyond confirming that all passengers and crew had been accounted for safely, according to Reuters correspondents. European aviation officials continued to monitor the situation without attributing the alerts to any specific group or motive, multiple agency statements indicated. The absence of any claim of responsibility left investigators examining whether the coordinated timing represented an attempt to test response protocols across several nations at once.
