No bomb found on plane diverted to Saskatoon

Twelve hours after a bomb threat resulted in an Edmonton-bound plane making an emergency landing at Saskatoon’s John Diefenbaker Airport, Saskatoon police say no explosive device was found on board.

The Saskatoon police explosive disposal unit cleared the plane Saturday shortly before 9 p.m. local time, turning the aircraft over to the Saskatoon Airport Authority. The ongoing investigation is being conducted by the Ontario Provincial Police, “as the threat originated in the province of Ontario,” Saskatoon police said in a news release.

No arrests were immediately made.

According to Saskatoon police, a call claiming there was an explosive device on the plane was received after the flight took off from Halifax early Saturday.

It landed in Saskatoon shortly after 9 a.m. where it was met by the Saskatoon police explosives disposal unit.

Passengers aboard the flight said they were not told about the threat until they were taken off the plane and led onto transit buses.

“Everyone was just kind of calmly looking out the windows waiting to get some word about what was going on,” said passenger Wade Wick, who was on his way home from a business trip.

He said people remained calm, even after news of the call was shared by passengers.

“Nothing had detonated yet so I wasn’t going to freak out,” he said.

Six crew members and 147 passengers were on board the WestJet flight. All were provided with food and water as they waited to talk to police and have their flights rescheduled.

“They were really good,” said passenger Rob Tomlinson, who had snagged a turkey sandwich by 1 p.m. and was attempting to find another flight to Edmonton.

“The whole atmosphere on the plane was calm, everybody was pretty good.”

Stephen Maybury, president and CEO of the Saskatoon airport, said he was pleased with how the airport and police responded to the incident.

“The response was to a possible threat. We followed that to a T,” he said.