Bomb threat forces Korea-bound plane to land in Comox
Posted April 10, 2012 10:29 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
COMOX (NEWS1130) – Korean Air confirms its US call centre received a threat that an explosive was on board a flight that was forced to land in Comox.
Korean Air Flight 72, which departed Vancouver’s YVR airport at 2:40 p.m,. was over the Pacific before it was forced to turn around. Fighters jets escorted the Boeing 777 to Comox, located about 110 km northwest from Vancouver.
The RCMP were called out to meet the plane once it landed. All 149 people on-board are said to be safe.
Passengers have left the plane and are being screened.
The plane landed safely at CFB Comox under the escort of two U-S fighter jets from Portland, Oregon.
Korean Air says a U-S call centre received the threat about 25 minutes after the flight took off from Vancouver.
Korean Air says all passengers and crew are safe and that the airline is conducting an inspection and “will evaluate a new departure time after discussion.”
Security expert embarrassed by American help
SFU’s André Gerolymatos says our aging F-18s can’t handle our needs and it highlights the problems with Canada’s aging fleet.
“When you think about it, it’s embarrassing we can’t handle our own air space. We are allies with the United States, so out of the goodness of their hearts and of course, for their own protection, they would dispatch their fighters to help in a situation like this.”
He says this hits at the crux of the controversy over the future of Canada’s air force, including the planned F-35s.
“If we want to control our own air space, we have to have an air force that can do it. It’s not something that’s unusual, so we should not be surprised if in the future, we might have a situation where there’s a plane that might have a dangerous passenger or even a bomb on it.”
NORAD says the two F-15 fighter jets were scrambled out of Portland, Oregon and shadowed the Korean Air flight to Comox.
