Chile arrests two as bomb threats ground nine planes

SANTIAGO: Chilean police said Friday they had arrested two people for making bomb threats that forced the grounding of nine commercial flights the day before.

A 29-year-old man in the northern city of Antofagasta was arrested after police managed to “geo-reference telephone calls linked to threats of there being explosive devices on various flights,” police chief Diego Rojas told reporters. The flights involved Latam and Chilean low-cost carrier Sky Airlines and affected airspace above Chile, Peru and Argentina. One Latam flight, with more than 80 passengers aboard, had to make an emergency landing in Lima, airport authorities there said. The man, whom police named as Franco Sepulveda, made the calls after one of the airlines lost his baggage. “In the first instance there is information that we have to ratify, which indicates that this person would have planned a flight, would have left his suitcase and not got it back, and would have made these calls, annoyed with the company and the entire air traffic system,” said Rojas.