A fresh wave of bomb threats against aircraft has put European air transport on alert, with at least five flights bound for or departing from Italy at the centre of the incidents, according to Italian news agency ANSA.
Among them was Aegean Airlines flight A3552, which departed Thessaloniki for Milan and landed as scheduled at Malpensa airport at 9:33am on Thursday. Ryanair flight FR8953 from Porto also received a bomb threat and landed at 10:22am.
Police bomb disposal teams were sent to Milan airport, where they searched the aircraft, baggage, staff and passengers. Neither flight had to be diverted and both landed as scheduled.
Escorted by fighter jets
Meanwhile, fighter jets escorted a Finnair flight from Helsinki to Rome, which landed at Fiumicino. Searches of the aircraft and baggage found nothing suspicious.
Two more flights were diverted. An Aer Lingus Airbus A320 operating the Dublin-Rome route landed at the French airport of Évreux, escorted by French Rafale fighter jets. Meanwhile, a Wizz Air Airbus A321 flying from Milan to Warsaw was diverted to Vienna.
The threats were not confined to Italy. Three aircraft bound for Bulgaria landed in Sofia and Plovdiv, while an alert was also raised in the Czech Republic, where four flights bound for Prague received threats. Czech police said the threats were not considered credible, but activated the required security measures.
According to ANSA, the threats against the Helsinki-Rome and Dublin-Rome flights came in an anonymous email written in Italian and sent to email addresses used by companies operating at Rome airport. Italian authorities are investigating.
The incidents follow a series of similar false alarms in recent days that have disrupted European air travel, with no explosive devices found so far.