Threat grounds Air Tindi planes
Airline president says four aircraft landed and held temporarily on tarmac Friday during investigation
Shane Magee
Northern News Services
Wednesday, December 7, 2016
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Passengers of two Air Tindi flights had to wait about 30 minutes inside their planes on the Yellowknife airport tarmac Friday as the company and RCMP investigated a threat made to the airline.
RCMP confirmed Friday the force was investigating and later issued a news release stating the threat was deemed to be a hoax.
"There is no public safety risk or concern at this time," RCMP spokesperson Marie York-Condon said Friday afternoon.
Air Tindi president Alasdair Martin said the company received a phone call just before the lunch hour that included a threat, though he didn't get into details about the nature of what was said.
The company had four flights in the air at the time. Passenger flights from Whati and Lutsel K'e were headed to Yellowknife. A medevac flight without a patient was also en route to the city. Another medevac flight with a patient was en route to Edmonton.
The planes landed in Yellowknife and were held at one end of the airport as RCMP investigated the threat, Martin said.
Passengers were kept waiting on the planes for about a half-hour. The company was told the threat was likely not credible and passengers were then able to get off.
"Whenever you have a threat you have to take it seriously until you've got comfort that it isn't a credible threat," Martin said in an interview at the airline's airport terminal at around 1:30 p.m. Friday, as operations began to return to normal.
Martin addressed the half-full passenger waiting area to assure them the company had dealt with the issue and apologized for the delay.
One woman approached him concerned about the safety of the flights.
"It's kind of scary," she said.
Martin said in an interview the company was taking extra precautions.
"What we're doing now is for our own peace of mind - checking all the planes that go out this afternoon. Obviously some of the passengers waiting to fly out are a little bit nervous," he said.
Martin said what happened Friday was a first during his time with the airline.
The company has plans and carries out drills for incidents like what happened Friday, which makes it a lot less stressful for airline employees than it might otherwise be, he said.
Yellowknife Airport operations weren't impacted, Department of Transportation spokesperson Ioana Spiridonica stated.
