Canadian fighter jets escorted a Cathay Pacific airliner coming from Hong Kong to a safe landing in Vancouver International Airport on Saturday following a bomb threat, officials said.Royal Canadian Mounted Police said that passengers had been safely taken off the plane and that nothing of concern had been found in the baggage.”This is incident is being taken very seriously,” Cpl. Sherrdean Turley, adding the threat regarding Flight CX838 was called in to police at about 10:45 a.m. local time.
Canadian F-18 Hornet fighter jets intercepted the Airbus 8340 with 283 passengers and 14 crew members aboard and flew alongside it until it landed around 1:40 p.m. local time.”As a precaution, NORAD fighters escorted the aircraft until it landed safely in Vancouver,” said North American Aerospace Defense Command’s Maj. Holly Apostoliuk.
via Source.
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What is the mission of the escorts and what could the escorts do if a bomb did go off. I have never understood why they escort a suspicious plane when they have no way to stop a hijacking or a bomb threat. Maybe they’d shoot it down if it started to aim for a bldg. or populated area.
The only other thing I can think of is to take photos for post-event investigations.