Jets escorted after toilet alerts
Fighter jets escorted two flights – one to New York City, another to Detroit - after passengers’ use of the bathrooms aroused suspicions on the 10th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks.
On a Los Angeles-to-New York American Airlines flight, three passengers made repeated trips to the bathroom, officials said.
The three were cleared after the plane landed safely at New York’s Kennedy Airport.
Earlier, on a Denver-to-Detroit Frontier Airlines flight, the crew reported that two people were spending “an extraordinarily long time” in a bathroom, Frontier spokesman Peter Kowalchuck said.
Police detained three passengers at Detroit’s Metropolitan Airport after the plane landed without incident. They were released after questioning.
In both instances, the FBI said the jets shadowed the planes “out of an abundance of caution”.
New York, in particular, has been in a heightened state of security after federal officials received a credible but uncorroborated tip of a car bomb plot on the September 11 anniversary in either New York or Washington.
