An easyJet flight bound for London has made an unscheduled stop in Germany, with 151 passengers forced to disembark via emergency slides, after an alarm was raised over a “suspicious conversation” overheard on-board.
The plane, which had taken off from Slovenia, landed at Cologne-Bonn airport at around 6.30pm local time, and per airport authorities, all passengers were taken to take to a transit gate where they were checked by police.
German news agency DPA report that a piece of baggage from the flight was destroyed outside the terminal, after it could not be assigned to any of the passengers.
Take-offs and landings at Cologne-Bonn were suspended for three hours after the incident, causing delays across the grid as a number of flights were diverted to other places.
A representative of the airline made a statement to the media, saying:
“easyJet can confirm that flight EZY3246 from Ljubljana to London Stansted diverted to Cologne today. The Captain took the decision as a precaution to enable the aircraft to go through additional security checks in Cologne where the aircraft was met by the police. In compliance with the local authorities guidance passengers disembarked to allow additional security checks to be performed. We plan to operate the flight tomorrow morning and so are providing all passengers with hotel accommodation and refreshments along with regular updates. We thank passengers for their understanding. The safety of easyJet’s passengers and crew is our highest priority.”
Source: The Independent.
Photo: Sean Gallup / Getty.
