Thursday March 28th, 2024
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Two Consecutive False Bomb Threats On Flights To Hurghada

An aircraft headed to Hurghada was grounded following a bomb alert by a drunken passenger, making this the second recent incident of bomb threats aboard flights to Hurghada.

Staff Writer

A flight from Warsaw, Poland, carrying 161 passengers, was grounded due to a bomb threat while headed to the resort town of Hurghada. The plane landed in Burgas Airport at 05:48 AM, after making a request for emergency landing. Upon evacuating all passengers and crew, the plane was searched and, according to the Bulgarian authorities, no bombs were found on board. The entire airport was evacuated, and a spokeswoman for the Burgas Airport told Reuters that the airport will remain closed.

A release made by Polish authorities said, "The plane landed in Burgas at 5:48 AM after a request for flight number LLP8015 travelling from Warsaw to Hurghada to make an emergency landing, due to a report of the presence of explosives on board." The aircraft did not belong to the Polish National Airline; it was a charter flight headed to Hurghada, but the same procedures apply since it departed from a Polish airport. The drunken passenger who alerted the crew about the presence of the explosives was immediately taken into custody; upon questioning, he admitted that he had consumed alcohol.

This seems to be a reoccurring incident in light of recent news of another bomb threat on a flight heading to Hurghada from Cairo Airport. A citizen from the Czech Republic reported having overheard a passenger sitting next to him being told over the phone about explosives on board. The plane was evacuated and searched; nothing was found.

Since the attack on the Russian flight in Egypt's Sinai, Egyptian authorities have been taking bomb threats very seriously. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Elsisi agreed over a phone call with his Russian counterpart, President Vladimir Putin, on joint co-operation between Egyptian and Russian authorities to ensure that Egyptian airports employ "a proper level of security".