Threat to blow up 11 aircraft, says US caller

New Delhi: There was a major security scare across several airports in the country, including the national capital, following a phone call from the US that 11 aircraft of private carrier IndiGo could be in the danger of being blown up.

Airline sources were cited by news agencies as saying the caller, who identified himself only as Smith from the US, said at least 11 flights of IndiGo, which were either ready for take off or had already departed from around 10 airports, were facing bomb threat from a woman flyer.

One of the flights (Srinagar-Jammu-Delhi) named by the caller that had landed in the capital was taken to an isolation bay at the Delhi airport and thoroughly searched but nothing dangerous was found.  Some of the other flights named by the caller had already taken off from Delhi by then.

Sources said the call was later found to be a hoax. The threat was for flights emanating from major airports like Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Srinagar, Vadodara, Guwahati, Goa and Kochi, the sources were cited as saying.

“As many as 11 IndiGo flights were grounded today (at various airports) after the airline’s call centre at Chennai received a message about bomb threat.
“The caller, who identified himself as one Smith from the US, said that a woman passenger allegedly belonging to the ISI of Pakistan was carrying a bomb and could blow up one of the aircraft,” sources said.

In a statement, IndiGo said its call-centre at Chennai received a bomb threat call at 11.13 hours and within minutes the security agencies were informed. IndiGo said, “All our passengers are safe.”  Security agencies were carrying out extensive search on these planes across nine airports.

The 11 flights are Vadodara-Delhi (6E 591), Kochi-Delhi (516), Delhi-Srinagar (853), Delhi-Chennai (443), Ahme-dabad-Kolkata (135), Delhi-Mumbai (223), Chen-nai-Mumbai (612), Delhi-Goa (329), Guwahati-Delhi (571), Delhi-Ahmedabad (161) and Delhi-Vadodara (734).