'Disorderly' Va. man taken off plane

A 47-year-old Virginia man taken off an airplane Friday in Colorado and held in jail over the weekend is expected to appear in federal court in Denver on Monday and be charged with interfering with a flight crew.

Muhammad Abu Tahir, of Glen Allen, a community just north of Richmond, was reportedly drinking and acting in an unruly manner aboard an AirTran Airways flight from Atlanta to San Francisco. The pilot chose to divert the aircraft to Colorado Springs, where Tahir was removed before the flight resumed.

Two F-16 fighter jets were scrambled from the North American Aerospace Defense Command headquarters in Colorado Springs. They remained above Colorado Springs Airport until local law enforcement authorities arrived, Lt. Commander Gary Ross said yesterday.

Tahir is a Pakistani national who has been in the United States since at least 2002. His occupation and immigration status could not be learned yesterday. He was reportedly traveling alone. According to press accounts he refused to follow instructions by flight attendants and at one point locked himself in the airplane lavatory.

Tahir, who turned 47 Saturday, was being held in the El Paso County jail at the request of the FBI, said Josh Sepelak, a security technician there. He is being kept separate from the other 1,400 inmates.

He has not yet been charged with a crime. Interference with a flight crew is a federal felony. Kathy Wright, a spokeswoman for the FBI office in Denver, would not say whether authorities believe Friday's events constituted a terrorist threat. However, she said that based on initial reports "he was just a disorderly passenger."

A similar event occurred on Wednesday when a Hawaiian Airlines flight from Portland, Ore., to Maui turned around after a passenger bickered with a flight attendant about a carry-on bag he was holding on his lap, and then filled out a comment card with what was considered to be threatening language. Two military jets were scrambled that time, too.

Ross said that NORAD either put up jets, or called ones already in the air to investigate another aircraft, about 180 times last year. In most cases the problem involves an airplane getting too close to restricted air space.

Researcher Eddy Palanzo contributed to this article.