In this day and age if someone has been locked in aircraft toilets for rather a long time it can be taken as a threat, so when two passengers locked themselves in the toilet for “an extraordinarily long time,” two F-16 fighter jets were scrambled to shadow the US plane until the passengers came out.
No surprising the suspicious activity was reported to be a couple who were getting rather amorous in the small toilet cubical. According to US TV network ABC officials told them that the unruly passengers were just “making out” on board the domestic flight from Denver destined for Detroit. The airline landed safely however SWAT police and local authorities searched the aircraft to make sure it was safe.
According to witness, Ilona Hajdar, of Michigan, ‘two men and a woman were escorted off the plane’. It’s known that the passengers were detained for questioning before being released without charge, but it’s not known why three people were arrested.
Belinda Duggan, of Michigan another passenger on board The Frontier Airlines Flight 623 explained the drama she saw: “All of a sudden, a SWAT team went through and saying, please place your hands on the seat in front of you.”
Sniffer dogs inspected the baggage that had been on board before passengers could collect it. There is a heightened security alert on all US flights after the North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD) issued warning around the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.
The FBI said that NORAD scrambled the fighter jets to shadow the plane “out of an abundance of caution.” But FBI Detroit spokeswoman Sandra Berchtold said authorities ultimately determined there was no real threat. She said: “Due to the anniversary of September 11, all precautions were taken, and any slight inconsistency was taken seriously. The public would rather us err on the side of caution than not.”
Picture courtesy of skinnylawyer