Two Air France Flights Headed to Paris Diverted

Two Air France planes flying to Paris from the USA with a total of around 750 people on board were diverted and landed safely early this morning after anonymous bomb threats were received. But given the recent attacks in in France, Rodgers suspected there might be more to the plane’s sudden change of course.

Someone called in a bomb threat against the flight, according to CNN.

“I think I would rather come to Halifax for the night than risk my plane exploding over the Atlantic”, said passenger Frank Mather. The first aircraft, out of Los Angeles, had landed in Salt Lake City (Utah), but left five hours later for Paris- the time to “make a complete check of the aircraft, passengers and their baggage”, in the words of a company spokesman.

One was diverted to Salt Lake City International Airport about 45 minutes after leaving Los Angeles. The plane landed without incident and all the passengers got off safely.

The flight diverted to Salt Lake City had 497 passengers and crew aboard. “They put stairs up to the emergency exit and then within 10 minutes we disembarked”, said Russo.

A spokesperson for Halifax Stansfield International Airport told the CBC that passengers were leaving the plane – Air France Flight 55.

The FBI issued a release stating that nothing was found aboard the Airbus A-380 used for flight 65 that was deemed a threat either, according to Reuters.

It’s unclear what caused the diversion of the Boeing 777, which was carrying 298 passengers and crew.

The plane was headed from Los Angeles to Paris. Later, the airline said that the passengers would leave Halifax on Wednesday evening.

It was the second high-profile friendly to be cancelled after last Friday’s attacks in Paris, following the Belgian authorities’ decision to postpone the country’s game against Spain in Brussels amid security fears. The Washington Post says nothing was found on flight 65 either. “Nobody knows what’s going on”, Moran said.

The threats came four days after act of terror rocked six locations of French capital Paris with guns and bombs that killed at least 129 innocent people.