The Laughing Wolf

NY-Bound Jetliner Grounded For Suspected Bomb

Sky News is reporting that an Olympic Airlines jet bound for New York was escorted by Tornado fighters and has landed at Stansted Airport after the pilot reported he believed a bomb to be on board. Updates as they become available.

LW

NOTE TO FNC: Olympic Airways and the Olympics are two separate things.

From Sky News, the plane was bound from Athens to NY and was diverted "under full emergency conditions" to Stansted. FNC is reporting that a Spanish passenger claimed to have a bomb, no verification on this so far.

No news on the Olympic site and the last press release was issued in June. From schedule information, this appears to be Flight 411 which departed Athens at 1230 hours local time. Athens airport has long had problematic security, which was a major issue for the Olympics. A number of changes were reportedly made for the Olympics, but current status is unknown.

Sky News is reporting the passengers are off, but no word on device or any of the info that has been reported on FNC.

AirWise shows that the flag carrier is up for sale or will be shortly.

Baghdad Broadcasting is reporting that the MoD portion is over, and a search of the plane underway. According to their story, a threat was phoned in to an Athens paper and authorities and the plane notified, prompting the pilot to request diversion.

UPDATE 1455 hours Eastern: Not a lot of new info to report. Sky News is reporting that there may have been up to three threats made, but that is not confirmed. More as I can find it.

UPDATE 1825 hours Eastern: Last report I can find is that search is still underway. More later.

UPDATE Monday AM: Plane has been cleared, and apparently the search was thorough. Instead of four or so hours, from reports the search went much longer. Glad this was done, and that the incident appears to have been a hoax. Far better to test procedures than to need them.