Bomb Scare On Rome-London Flight-Breaking News.

Just found this, not much news on it yet, at least it is grounded with passengers all safely away.

Why would you call in with a bomb scare before the plane has left the runway?
Wouldn't it of been more effective to wait.

All passengers on board an Alitalia plane at Rome airport due to fly to London were evacuated after an anonymous phone call said there were explosives on board, airport authorities have said.

Flight AZ-203 was due to take off from Rome's Fiumicino airport at 12.35pm UK time.

Instead all 165 passengers were evacuated and security personnel checked the luggage while the aircarft was surrounded by police and fire services.

More follows......

Link.



[edit on 21-7-2007 by Denied]

Either way it costs the airline a ton of money and a huge inconvenience. And that's something Alitalia can't afford right now. They're barely existing as it is right now IIRC. It doesn't cost them as much in fuel as it would if they were airborne, but depending on how they did the evacuation, it could keep the plane out of service for days, which would SERIOUSLY hurt the airline.

Perhaps it was a passenger late for their flight who called it in to delay things a bit until they got to the airport. Wouldn't be the first time that's happened

Originally posted by Britguy
Perhaps it was a passenger late for their flight who called it in to delay things a bit until they got to the airport.

Yeah thats the first thing that I thought of too.

Are not the government of Italy trying to sell this airline? If they are thats got to be bad news for shareholders?

They were almost grounded due to being in bankruptcy at one point before they were bailed out. They announced in September of 2004 that they didn't have enough money to pay worker salaries past the end of the month. They worked out a deal with the unions that allowed them to accept loans from the Italian government. They're still in trouble and facing liquidation to this day though. They tried to auction their stake but the auction fell through this week. They're losing about $2M Euros a day, and on Wednesday of last week had to ground 150 flights due to a worker strike.

Originally posted by Zaphod58
Either way it costs the airline a ton of money and a huge inconvenience. And that's something Alitalia can't afford right now. They're barely existing as it is right now IIRC. It doesn't cost them as much in fuel as it would if they were airborne, but depending on how they did the evacuation, it could keep the plane out of service for days, which would SERIOUSLY hurt the airline.

Well they kept this plane going today with a delayed flight

The passengers were allowed back on the flight and the plane was due to make a delayed take-off during the afternoon.

news.sky.com...

That's a little bit of good news for the airline then. God knows they need any bit of good news they can get the way things have gone for them the last few years.

Well, one thing is for sure- It wasnt Al Qaeda, it was

Guido Mozzarella,, that prankster!!!