European flights disrupted by repeated bomb threats
At least 12 flights across Europe were diverted or inspected on Thursday after bomb threats, none of which yielded explosives.
Several flights operating in Europe were affected by bomb threats on Thursday, marking the second wave of such alerts this week. The incidents involved routes to Italy, Poland, Bulgaria, Austria and the Czech Republic. An Aer Lingus flight from Dublin to Rome was diverted to Evreux air base in northern France as a security precaution, while a Finnair service from Helsinki to Rome landed as scheduled after being escorted by Italian fighter jets.
Other flights that received threats included a second Finnair service from Helsinki to Vienna, a Wizz Air flight from Milan to Warsaw that was rerouted to Vienna, and a Wizz Air service from Milan to Bucharest that landed safely for inspection. A LOT airline flight from Warsaw to Brussels and three Ryanair flights to Bulgaria also arrived without incident, and four flights that landed in Prague were examined by Czech police, who found no explosives.
"The flight landed safely and Aer Lingus will work to re-accommodate customers to their final destination as soon as possible," the airline said in a statement.
"No suspicious items were found," said a LOT representative.
"The UK government described the incidents as 'malicious hoax threats'," a spokesperson for the government told the BBC.
Aviation expert Marco Chan of Kingston University told the BBC that the threats were "most likely a hoax, but the system is right to treat it as real" and suggested they could represent "a pattern of cheap, deniable disruption" to air travel. He added that three days of incidents was insufficient to determine whether the alerts were coordinated or merely contagious.
Earlier in the week, seven aircraft were searched after bomb threats, including two from the United Kingdom and two Ryanair flights that landed in Rome. No explosives were discovered in any of the examinations.