Bomb scare on SFO flight bound for Tel Aviv

  • Planes take off and land at San Francisco International Airport in 2008. Photo: Michael Macor / The Chronicle / SFC


Passengers on a Delta Airlines flight out of San Francisco International Airport and bound for Tel Aviv got a scare Monday when a bomb threat — which turned out to be unfounded — was called into the airline’s headquarters.

The plane, Delta Airlines Flight 468, landed at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York at 7:40 p.m. eastern time, where about 200 passengers got off the plane. A K-9 search of the airplane was conducted and no bomb was found.

The plane had departed from SFO shortly before noon Monday and was scheduled to depart from New York for Tel Aviv, an airport duty manager said.


The source of the threat is still under investigation, according to Jon Pentangelo, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

The plane was still in the air at the time of the threat. When it landed in New York passengers were ordered to leave everything on the plane, including their carry-on bags, according to NBC 4 New York. Passenger Austen Holman told NBC said the captain didn’t announce what was happening until the plane had landed. He said the the captain calmly told passengers: “’We have some bad news. There’s been a threat on this plane.’”

“Everyone was like, ‘What does that mean?’” she told NBC. “For the most part, everyone remained pretty calm.”

J.K. Dineen is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: jdineen@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @sfjkdineen

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