Security test gone wrong forces jet to make emergency landing

This Alaskan Airlines jet was forced to make an emergency landing

March 11, 2000
Web posted at: 10:33 p.m. EST (0333 GMT)

SEATTLE (CNN) -- Two passengers were injured when a security test with a fake explosive at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Saturday afternoon backfired and forced an Alaskan Airlines MD-80 to make an emergency landing there, an airport official said.

Bob Parker, the airport spokesman, told CNN that Flight 444 was bound for Ontario, California, with 88 passengers and crew when the suspicious backpack was found aboard the plane.

The airliner turned round, made an emergency landing and passengers were evacuated by inflatable chutes.

Two were slightly injured and were treated and released from an area hospital.

Alaska Airlines spokesman Jack Evans told CNN that the company which handles security for Terminal D at the airport used a fake device intended to look like a real bomb, to test security personnel at an airport checkpoint.

He said they identified the object and determined it was a dummy device.

Moments later a small boy with an identical backpack came through the checkpoint. He took the wrong bag by accident and disappeared before anyone realized the dummy device had been picked up.

Parker said that 30 miles outside Seattle the boy asked a flight attendant to bring his backpack containing crayons and a coloring book down from the overhead compartment.

When she opened the backpack they discovered the realistic-looking device with wires attached.

"It is made to look like a bomb," Parker said. "The decision to return to the airport, pop the chutes and evacuate the plane was entirely appropriate."

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Seattle Tacoma International Airport - Washington Online Highways
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MD-80: Specifications

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