No suspicious items were found and no one was injured, but the threats have raised concern because they came as Europe digests other recent disruptions — including attacks on supermarket refrigeration systems and drone incursions.
In Hungary, the defense minister said military fighter jets escorted three separate passenger planes across the country's airspace within an hour after each received bomb threats. Romulusz Ruszin-Szendi said they were flights from Brussels to Sofia and from Prague to Cyprus and Romania.
French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu’s office said Friday that “four new bomb threats were made today against aircraft flying over French territory.” The planes landed safely at Paris’ Orly Airport and bomb disposal experts were conducting inspections. The office didn’t give details of the flights affected.
Other incidents included threats against a Prague to Bucharest flight operated by Romanian carrier Tarom, and a Ryanair flight traveling from Lisbon to Rome. Security inspections were carried out and no explosives were found.
A WizzAir flight from Prague to Rome was diverted to Venice after a bomb alert, and passengers were evacuated after the aircraft landed. Air traffic at the airport was briefly suspended, but police searches turned up nothing.
At Prague's Vaclav Havel Airport, spokesperson Denisa Hejtmánková said a total of nine flights were threatened, including arriving flights from Denmark, Spain and Britain, and departing flights to the Netherlands, Cyprus, Romania, Italy and Britain. Czech police said security measures were taken that had “a minimal impact on the normal operations at the airport.”
It remains unclear who is behind the wave of airline hoaxes, which come at a time of increased geopolitical tensions and warnings from authorities that Russia may be ramping up so-called hybrid threats in Europe.
