Bomb hoaxes disrupt European flights and target media outlets

A series of hoax bomb threats on Friday led to additional flight diversions in Europe and expanded to target newsrooms. British broadcaster Sky confirmed it received a threat and said a security assessment had been carried out and the matter reported to authorities.

Bulgaria’s Nova TV and Ireland’s public broadcaster RTE were emailed threats allegedly from a figure calling himself “Mikhail Andropov”. RTE briefly evacuated staff in Dublin after the message warned a bomb would explode within 45 minutes. The Irish government said similar hoax claims were also sent to Virgin Media, Newstalk radio and The Irish Independent, and noted the source of the threats was unknown.

Hungarian Defence Minister Romulusz Ruszin-Szendi said jets escorted airliners from Brussels to Sofia and from Prague to Bucharest and Cyprus through Hungarian airspace, and that NATO ordered an air patrol near the Hungarian-Romanian border. Danish police reported threats aimed at traffic at Copenhagen Airport, which continued operating normally. Czech police logged bomb threats to nine flights in Prague, though no flights were cancelled. French authorities recorded four new threats to aircraft over French territory, with all flights landing safely.

The incidents follow hoax bomb alerts that disrupted more than two dozen flights on Thursday and earlier alerts to a cruise ship and other aircraft.

"The number of hoax threats this week is making governments sit up and take notice about where this might be coming from and also think of solutions for how to deal with it," reported Frances Read of Al Jazeera.