Pilot’s Keyboard Error May Have Triggered Hijack Alert At Nuremberg Airport

NUREMBERG (Germany), Oct 14 (Bernama-dpa) -- A pilot is believed to have accidentally entered the wrong code, triggering a hijack alert at Germany’s Nuremberg Airport, German Press Agency (dpa) reported on Wednesday, citing a police spokesman.

According to initial investigations, the pilot intended to report a radio failure on Tuesday but accidentally entered the code for an aircraft hijacking, the spokesman said.

Instead of transmitting the code for a radio failure, the aircraft’s transponder transmitted the code indicating a hijacking.

The alert prompted a major response in Nuremberg, involving a negotiation team trained to communicate with hijackers and the Special Support Command (USK) of the Bavarian police.

Military aircraft began escorting the plane while it was in Croatian airspace, while Austrian jets were also placed on alert by the Austrian Armed Forces.

Once the aircraft entered German airspace, two Eurofighter jets from Tactical Air Wing 74 escorted it all the way to Nuremberg.

Police said on Wednesday that the Boeing 737-800’s radio was also defective.

As a result, the crew could no longer be contacted after the plane took off from the Greek island of Corfu.

The pilot was probably unaware of the error, police spokesman Michael Petzold said.

Once transmitted, a code cannot be withdrawn.

Police are not investigating the pilot, as he is believed to have acted unintentionally.

Emergency responders had less than an hour to react between the distress signal and the aircraft’s landing, Petzold said.

He added that police had prepared for the worst-case scenario within a very short time.

-- BERNAMA-dpa