Air India Express, Vistara flights get bomb threats, 16 incidents in one week

Mangalore Today News Network

New Delhi, October 19, 2024: Five flights operated by Indian carriers received bomb threats in the last 24 hours, prompting security checks and flight diversions.

Three international flights of Vistara Airlines received bomb threats early Saturday morning, but they turned out to be hoaxes after checks. A Vistara flight from Delhi to London was diverted to Frankfurt, and the flight resumed its journey from there after no threats were found.

An Air India Express flight from Dubai to Jaipur, with 189 passengers on board, received a bomb threat via email, according to officials. Akasa Air also reported that its flight QP 1366, scheduled to fly from Bengaluru to Mumbai on Friday, received a security alert shortly before departure.

The Delhi-London Vistara flight landed safely at Frankfurt Airport at around 12.40 am (Indian time), and mandatory checks were conducted. It departed from Frankfurt for London after about two hours, the airline said on Saturday. Air India Express from Dubai landed in Jaipur at 1.20 am, and nothing suspicious was found after the checks.

In the past one week, around 20 flights have received similar threats. On Thursday alone, five flights received bomb threats, all of which turned out to be false alarms.

The investigating agencies have found some common lines and words used in these fake threats like "bombs", "blood will spread everywhere", "explosive devices", "this is not a joke" and "you will all die" and "bomb rakhwa dia hai" (Hindi for bomb has been placed) among others.

A 17-year-old boy from Chhattisgarh was detained by Mumbai Police in connection with threats to three flights originating from Mumbai on October 14. Some of the IP addresses of the devices from which the threat was posted were traced to foreign locations, including London. Various police teams have contacted Virtual Private Network (VPN) service providers and social media platforms for information regarding the threat messages. VPNs hide IP addresses, making it difficult to track physical locations.

The Civil Aviation Ministry plans to implement stricter regulations to prevent hoax bomb threats, including placing perpetrators on the no-fly list.