Multiple aircraft diverted across Europe
At least 18 aircraft across Europe faced bomb threats this Thursday. I find the scale of this disruption, involving flights bound for Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, France, Italy, Poland, and Romania, highly unsettling. An Aer Lingus flight, EI402, diverted from Dublin to the Evreux air base in northern France, which forced the airline to re-accommodate 157 passengers after the plane landed safely. In Italy, two Finnair flights from Helsinki faced hoax threats; one required an escort from Italian Air Force fighter jets to land in Rome. I see a pattern of chaos where a Wizz Air plane traveling from Milan to Warsaw diverted to Vienna and a Ryanair flight from London to Sofia diverted to Plovdiv, Bulgaria.
Other diverted flights included a Wizz Air plane from Milan to Bucharest that landed safely after teams inspected the aircraft. In Bulgaria, three Ryanair flights landed in Sofia and Plovdiv, and one flight from London arrived under a Bulgarian air force fighter jet escort. Czech police reported that no explosives were found on four flights that landed in Prague. I find it notable that Spanish airport authorities received threats affecting three flights in Madrid, but inspections ruled out the danger. Bomb disposal experts also inspected Aegean Airlines and Ryanair flights arriving in Milan from Thessaloniki and Porto. LOT reported that its flight from Warsaw to Brussels landed without suspicious items, while its second flight from Warsaw to Paris sat on the runway for a security screening. No hazardous items appeared during the search of the LOT aircraft, and the airline used a replacement plane for the flight. Two Ryanair flights, one leaving Dublin and the other from Lisbon, were searched after landing in Rome following anonymous tips, but no explosives were found.
Email threats from a new group
The threats in Rome arrived via email to two inbound flights on Thursday. The messages used the name "Fighters of the Male State" and targeted a "feminist regime" while claiming the group wanted to "make our mark on history." These senders threatened to "turn the skies red" with explosions. I find the group’s specific targeting of a "feminist regime" a bizarre addition to the week’s wave of "malicious hoax threats," as UK Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander described them. The Italian media first reported these details before Aeroporti di Roma, which manages both of the city’s airports, confirmed the information to the BBC. This incident follows a series of threats from earlier in the week, when eight flights – including two from the UK – received threats. Two of those earlier flights traveled from Manchester to Murcia and from London Heathrow to Warsaw. On Monday and Tuesday, seven passenger aircraft underwent searches in Spain, Poland, Italy, and Bulgaria, which led to the temporary closure of Warsaw Chopin Airport. One Wizz Air flight from London Luton to Sofia even required a Hungarian fighter jet escort to Budapest on Monday.
Security experts evaluate the pattern
Aviation security professor Philip Baum noted that while the industry faces threats every single day, the recent frequency surprised him. He said authorities divert flights only when they believe a threat is credible and there is a potential for an explosive device. Marco Chan, an aviation expert at Kingston University, told the BBC that the system is right to treat these as real, even if they are likely hoaxes. He suggested the incidents might be "possibly part of a pattern of cheap, deniable disruption" to air travel. Ben Smith, CEO of Air France – KLM, told an earnings call that the threats happened in a "coordinated way." I agree with Jan-Arwed Richter, the CEO of JACDEC, that the risk of someone successfully smuggling a bomb aboard a commercial flight remains low because modern security rectifies most loopholes. EU Transport Commissioner Apostolos Tzitzikostas noted it is too early to conclude if the incidents are linked and confirmed the EU-level information sharing mechanism for aviation security is active, although he noted he does not have information yet on whether this is a cyber attack.
