'You are bombed', suspicious passenger chat delays Mangaluru-Mumbai IndiGo flight by 6 hours

An IndiGo Mangaluru-Mumbai flight was delayed by around six hours after a female flyer found a male fellow passenger exchanging text messages with someone, wherein he was referred to as a "bomber".

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A female passenger boarding the Mangaluru to Mumbai IndiGo flight raised an alarm about a suspicious text message she saw on a fellow male traveller's phone resulting in a delayed flight by six hours. As per agency reports, as all the passengers were boarding the plane at Mangaluru airport, the female passenger peered into the male passenger's mobile phone when he was exchanging text messages with his girlfriend. The lady passenger saw that the male passenger was once referred as "bomber" in the exchange of text messages, and she raised an alarm with the flight attendants.

The crew alerted the Air Traffic Controller, and the flight that was ready to take off returned to the bay. All of the passengers were asked to disembark the plane, and their luggage was carefully examined for any signs of sabotage, according to police. The man was chatting with his girlfriend, who was to catch a flight to Bengaluru from the same airport. The man was later not allowed to board the flight due to the questioning that lasted for several hours, while his girlfriend missed her flight to Karnataka's capital.

All the 185 passengers were later reboarded on the Mumbai-bound flight after thorough checking of the baggage, and the airplane left at 5 pm. No complaint has been filed till late at night as it was a friendly chat between two friends over security, city police commissioner N Shashi Kumar said.

Earlier, an IndiGo flight from Jorhat, Assam, to Kolkata went off the runway before takeoff, the airline reported, and two of its wheels were stuck in the muddy outfield.

The incident occurred on Thursday as the plane was taxing out for takeoff with 98 passengers aboard, and the flight was cancelled as a result, it said. "During takeoff, IndiGo flight 6E-757, which runs from Jorhat to Kolkata, returned to the bay. The captain was informed that one of the main wheels had partially run over the grass next to the taxiway as they were exiting the aircraft "In a statement, the airline stated.

With agency inputs