Passengers of false alarm emergency flight depart for Paris

A majority of the hundreds of passengers on an Air France flight from Mauritius to Paris that had been prompted to make an emergency landing after a suspicious device was found departed Kenya late on Sunday (December 20) evening.

Air France staff decided to land the Boeing 777 at the nearest airport — in the Kenyan port city of Mombasa — after a passenger found the object in the toilets late on Saturday and alerted crew.

The suspicious object, which was made out of cardboard and paper and contained a timer, was harmless and caused a “false alarm”, the airline’s chief executive Frederic Gagey said earlier at a news conference in the French capital, adding that it must have been planted during the flight.

Mombasa County Commissioner Nelson Marwa said the passengers had departed on another plane sent by Air France to pick them, but an undisclosed number of them who were being questioned by authorities had stayed behind, but did not say if they were under arrest.

Air France said it planned to take legal action over the incident, without giving further details.

The 459 passengers and 14 crew on board flight AF463 were evacuated using the emergency slides after the plane landed at 2136 GMT.

The device was retrieved from the aircraft by explosives experts from the Navy and DCI (Directorate of Criminal Investigations), Police Inspector General Joseph Boinnet said earlier on his Twitter account.

Kenyan Interior Minister Joseph Nkaissery told reporters at Mombasa’s Moi International Airport on Sunday that they were in touch with Mauritius to find out how security screening of passengers was done.

Air France said in a statement it had “immediately decided to reinforce the security measures in Mauritius” after the incident, which follows three bomb alerts in the United States in the last few weeks.

Airports of Mauritius, the operator of the airport in Plaine Magnien, said Deputy Prime Minister Xavier-Luc Duval would hold a meeting on Monday morning with government agencies involved in security to discuss measures taken following the incident.