Bomb threats ground flights across Europe for second day in a week – causing travel chaos

Bomb threats across Europe have grounded flights across several countries and caused travel disruptions on Thursday. It marks the second time this week that such widespread threats have been reported prompting fear and concern against the backdrop of a series of cyber-attacks affecting supermarket fridges and blood banks across the continent. Flights flying to and from the UK, Belgium, Ireland, Italy, Finland, Bulgaria, Spain and Denmark were impacted and were largely resolved by the end of the day. More than a dozen flights were targeted, included those from Copenhagen, Dublin, Helsinki, Madrid, Milan and Warsaw.A Finnair plane from Helsinki was safely escorted to its scheduled landing in Rome by Italian Air Force jets. A Ryanair aircraft landed at Sofia airport after planes flying from Copenhagen and Madrid landed in the Bulgarian capital, according to the country’s interior minister. Flights were grounded across Europe after bomb threats (Getty)Inspections of three Ryanair aircraft that received bomb threats and landed at the Bulgarian airports did not identify any issues, the country’s transport ministry said. “Upon landing, the necessary inspections were carried out in accordance with the applicable procedures and no issues were identified,” the country’s transport ministry told Reuters. Airport operations at both Sofia and Plovdiv airports have returned to normal, it said.Airports in the UK were also impacted amid threats reported at Heathrow and Birmingham airports. “Threats reported at Heathrow and Birmingham in the early hours of this morning have been resolved,” a government spokesperson said in a statement issued on Thursday. “It’s right that authorities treat any potential threats seriously — the UK has one of the most robust aviation security systems in the world, with well-tested processes for dealing with any threats, as well as malicious hoaxes, like those we’ve seen this week.”Bomb threats have impacted over a dozen flights (AP)The Times reported that the Metropolitan Police are continuing to monitor the situation. Finnair also said that its two affected flights had landed safely after being affected by bomb threats. Flights AY1761 from Helsinki to Rome and AY1471 from Helsinki to Vienna, faced unfounded or hoax bomb threats, the company said. “Both flights landed safely at their destinations, and customers have disembarked the aircraft,” it said and added that nothing suspicious was found on the planes.The plane to Rome was inspected and will depart back to Helsinki, while the flight to Vienna will “return to traffic normally after inspection.”The incidents followed hoax bomb threats earlier this week that prompted searches, diversions and, in one case, a military escort across at least seven flights in Europe. An airport in Poland was forced to close in a day of chaos on Tuesday. (Reuters)“Malicious” bomb scares on two flights from London, and others from Manchester, Copenhagen, Israel, Dublin, Bergamo and Lisbon threw airports into disarray, with authorities searching planes after some of the flights were forced to undergo emergency landings.Hundreds of passengers on board were affected as well as others who had been affected by the temporary closures of airports. On Wednesday, the French health ministry said that blood banks in France had been hit by a cyberattack amid a series of online hoaxes and cyberattacks. “Several regional facilities of the French Blood Establishment (EFS) were affected by a cybersecurity incident that impacted certain cold storage room monitoring and control systems,” the ministry said.Meanwhile, stores in eight European countries were forced to throw away vast quantities of food after hackers tampered with their fridges on Monday, mirroring hacks that swept dozens of supermarkets in France three weeks ago.