12 Held After Jet Returns to Amsterdam
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Wednesday, August 23, 2006; 4:48 PM
A Northwest Airlines flight bound for India from Amsterdam was escorted back to the Netherlands by two Dutch fighter jets today after the pilot radioed for help when a group of a dozen passengers began passing cell phones around the plane as it was taking off, raising suspicions. Police arrested 12 passengers, authorities said.
Police spokesman Rob Staenacker said he could not disclose the nationalities or the identities of the 12 arrested passengers, according to the Associated Press in Amsterdam.
An official from the Department of Homeland Security in Washington, who said DHS was "closely monitoring" the incident, said there was still a lot of "fact-finding" to be done. "What we do know . . . is there were cell phones being circulated as the plane was taking off and I believe after it departed eventually, and those cell phones were passed to one individual and that activity was considered suspicious enough to merit the plane being returned to Amsterdam," said the official, who asked not to be named because of the sensitive and sketchy nature of the information so far.
He said it appeared that at least one of the passengers would be arraigned Thursday in the Netherlands, although the exact charges were not known.
"What's going to be very important is getting additional information on the identities of the passengers involved, confirming their identities and from that obviously there will be a far better picture of the nature of the incident," the DHS official said.
Northwest Flight 0042 was over German airspace shortly after take-off from Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport, the pilot radioed for permission to return to the airport and asked for an escort of jet fighters because some of the passengers were acting suspiciously, the Dutch Defense Ministry said, according to AP.
Two Dutch F-16s escorted the plane back to Schiphol, the ministry said, according to the AP.
The plane was carrying 149 passengers. The flight was canceled until Thursday, and the passengers were put up in Dutch hotels, the AP reported.
