For the second time in a week, an Olympic Airlines jet has been forced to make an emergency landing after a threat that there was a bomb on board.
Olympic’s flight from Athens to New York landed at Ireland’s Shannon airport after a Greek newspaper received a call two hours after the jet had taken off.
The Guardian quotes a spokesman as saying: “The newspaper got a call at 1.45pm UK time saying a bomb was on board and would explode in an hour. After a meeting it was decided the plane would make an emergency landing at Shannon as it was the nearest airport.”
After a search of the plane, which found nothing untoward, the flight – along with its 295 passengers – continued to New York.
The BBC News website quotes David Learmount, of Flight International magazine, as saying that there are concerns that the two incidents this week could trigger “copycat” scares, which could create disruption for airlines.
Report by Tim Gillett, News From Abroad Ltd
