LONDON — Britain scrambled fighter jets Friday to intercept a commercial airliner carrying more than 300 people from Pakistan, diverting it to an isolated runway at an airport on the outskirts of London and arresting two British passengers on suspicion of endangering the aircraft.A British security official said the situation involving the Pakistan International Airlines flight did not appear terror-related, though police were still investigating, but the incident further rattled the U.K. just days after a soldier was killed on a London street in a suspected terror attack.
The security official requested anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the investigation.
Flight P709 was traveling from Lahore, Pakistan, to Manchester Airport when it was diverted by the fighter jets to Stansted Airport. The U.K. Ministry of Defense confirmed that Typhoon jets were launched to investigate an incident involving a civilian aircraft but gave no further details.
Passenger Nauman Rizvi told Pakistan’s GEO TV that two men who had tried to move toward the cockpit during the flight were handcuffed and arrested once the plane landed. Rizvi said that after the men were taken away, the flight crew told passengers there had been a terrorist threat and that the pilot had raised an alarm.
Essex Police said they were notified at 1:20 p.m. local time (12:20 GMT, 8:20 a.m. EDT) that a threat had been made to an aircraft. The force said that after the Boeing 777 landed at 2:15 p.m., armed officers entered it and arrested two British nationals, aged 30 and 41.