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Passenger jet en-route to London forced to land in Germany

November 14, 2022

The pilot of a passenger plane headed from Poland to the United Kingdom had to make an unscheduled landing in Paderborn because of a bomb threat.

https://p.dw.com/p/4JTPp
Paderborn-Lippstadt airport at night
Paderborn-Lippstadt airport has just one terminal and mainly handles leisure flights within EuropeImage: David Inderlied/Kirchner-Media/picture alliance

A jet carrying more than 200 people was forced to land in the western German city of Paderborn, so police could carry out a full search of the aircraft.

The call to ground the plane came after Polish air traffic control passed on a tip-off about a bomb threat. 

What do we know so far?

Police said that no suspicious objects were found during the search of the Airbus A321 aircraft operated by Hungarian carrier Wizz Air.

The plane departed from the western Polish city of Posnan late on Sunday headed for London Luton Airport. It was forced to land at Paderborn-Lippstadt airport at 10:05 p.m. 

Specially-trained police dogs were used in a full search of the aircraft. Further details of the threat, which was received by telephone, were initially unavailable. 

Police said attempts were made to accommodate the 199 passengers and 7 crew members in hotels for the night, before continuing with their journey on Monday. 

One plane due to land at Paderborn, one of Germany's smaller airports, was diverted to Düsseldorf so that staff could deal with the emergency landing.

The airport was reopened early on Monday morning with a flight to Munich setting off on schedule.

rc/rt (dpa, AFP)