Emergency on Air France flight a ‘false alarm,’ CEO says

The suspicious object was made out of cardboard and paper and contained a timer, Gagey said, adding that it must have been planted during the flight.

The device was retrieved from the aircraft by explosives experts from the Navy and DCI (Directorate of Criminal Investigations), Police Inspector General Joseph Boinnet said earlier on his Twitter account.

The four had all been on board Air France Flight 463, a Boeing 777 bound from Mauritius to Paris, which was diverted to the coastal Kenyan city of Mombasa after the device was found, Kenyan Cabinet secretary for the Ministry of Interior Joseph Nkaissery told CNN.

The threat, which originated from United States intelligence, had an immediate impact at British airports where passengers were subjected to more stringent and rigorous security checks.

The suspects include two Muslims who boarded the plane from Mauritius to Paris. “An emergency was prepared and it landed safely and all passengers evacuated”, police spokesman Charles Owino told the AFP news agency.

The Boeing 777 made an emergency landing in Kenya and had originally been due to land at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris.

“The plane just went down slowly, slowly, slowly, so we just realized probably something was wrong”, said Benoit Lucchini of Paris.

Air France said in a statement that as a precaution, all passengers were evacuated from the aircraft by its emergency slides. “We did not know what was happening”, said Lucchini.

France is still on high alert following bomb attacks and shootings in Paris last month that killed 130 people.

While the airline “regrets the inconvenience and the delay that was caused to its customers”, its “priority is to ensure the safety of its passengers”, he said.

This post has been updated to reflect the arrest of some of the plane’s passengers. “Something wrong in the toilet, it could be a bomb”. “A few passengers are being interrogated”, he said.

Gagey said the crew was alerted, and the pilots informed.

Kenyan security authorities have confirmed that a bomb was discovered aboard an Air France plane that had been carrying 473 passengers from Mauritius to Paris. “In this case I think the crew made a really rational decision”. No bombs were found on the planes from Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. Price said he would have told passengers of that problem and reassured them. A couple of people got twisted ankles but no one seriously injured, Ciaran said.