Airline staffer mishears 'ballast' as 'blast', leads to security scare at Bhopal airport

An airline staffer's act of mistaking the word "ballast" for "blast" created a security scare at the Raja Bhoj International Airport in Bhopal and led to sounding of an alert at the establishment, officials said on Friday.

The incident occurred on Thursday morning, the airport officials said. In a statement, the airport authorities said, "At 0925 hrs, Indigo ticketing counter received a call enquiring about ballast in flight 6E-7931 bound for Agra, which was misunderstood by the Indigo staff as blast. The Bomb Threat Assessment Committee (BATC) was called and after analysing the facts it declared the call as non-specific."

Acting director of the airport Amrit Minj said as the emergency was declared at the airport, all the security systems were activated. "Unfortunately, a fast-moving vehicle was crossing through the tyre killers, when the emergency switch of the tyre killers got activated and blocked the vehicle. Airport management regrets the inconvenience and damage caused due to this unfortunate incident," he said.