Bomb scare forces GoAir plane diversion to Nagpur

Threat turns out to be a hoax; Pune police detain one person suspected of making hoax calls earlier as well

A bomb scare forced diversion of a GoAir Airbus A320 plane to Nagpur, and delayed the departure of an Bhubaneshwar-Mumbai IndiGo flight on Saturday morning.

The Pune Police have detained one person in connection with the incident. The arrested person is said to have made hoax calls earlier too.

The Mumbai-bound GoAir aircraft with over 150 passengers had taken off from Bhubaneshwar at around 8:20 am. About twenty minutes later, the terminal manager’s  office in Bhubaneshwar received three  calls from a person who claimed he was carrying a bomb  on the Mumbai-bound flight.

The air traffic control alerted the pilot of the GoAir flight, who decided to land in Nagpur.

The departure of the  IndiGo aircraft that was supposed take off from Bhubaneswar for Mumbai was also put on hold following the threat call. The IndiGo aircraft was taxiing to the runway and was instructed by air traffic control to proceed to an isolation bay. A security check was carried out and the IndiGo plane took off for Mumbai only at 11:50 am.

In a statement, GoAir said: “The GoAir flight G8 243 took off from Bhubaneshwar for Mumbai at 8.20 am and post receiving the bomb threat call, was diverted to Nagpur and landed there at 9.29 am. After deplaning the 150 passengers, checks were conducted by the airport security. No bomb was found.

Post clearance from the authorities, the passengers reboarded and the flight took off at 12 noon. The GoAir officials at Bhubaneshwar immediately informed the local police. The matter is being investigated.”