A Turkish Airlines flight TK 0065 on its way from Bangkok to Istanbul made an emergency landing at the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport here on Tuesday afternoon after a bomb scare.
The pilots contacted Nagpur ATC after finding a threatening message. The flight was diverted to IGI.
Passengers, crew questioned
The pilots on the flight found a message, written on the mirror in the toilet with lipstick, that read “Bomb in Cargo Hold.”
The flight was diverted to Delhi, where it made an emergency landing at IGI. All emergency services were pressed into action.
After the plane landed at about 1.40 p.m., it was taken to an isolated bay where various security agencies including the NSG and CISF searched it.
All 134 passengers and 14 crew members on board were interrogated by the counter-terror wing of the Intelligence Bureau, the Research and Analysis Wing and local police.
Civil Aviation Secretary R.N. Choubey confirmed that no bomb was found and the flight was later cleared for take-off. Asked why the flight was not diverted to Mumbai, he said Delhi had certain handling facilities not available there. He also said operations at the IGI airport were not affected.
Ali Genç, a spokesperson of Turkish Airlines, said: “All of our passengers and cabin crew were evacuated safely and taken to the terminal building and standard safety procedures were put into play.”
