The Indian aviation industry has been rocked by over 70 hoax bomb threats since 13th October this year. The Indian airlines, serving both domestic and international routes, have suffered route diversions, flight delays and loss of crores of rupees.
Air India Express, Air India, IndiGo, Vistara, Alliance Air, SpiceJet, Star Air and Akasa Ai have been hit the hardest. A whopping 70% of these hoax bomb threats were made by an X (formerly Twitter) handle called ‘adamlanza111’.
The account, which now stands suspended, issued false alarms regarding 46 domestic and international flights between Friday (18th October) and Saturday (19th October).
The X account ‘adamlanza111’ posted 12 hoax bomb threats on Friday and 34 on the following day. The anonymous and unverified handle later on began issuing threats to international carriers such as Jet Blue, American Airlines, and Air New Zealand.
“There are bombs onboard five of your planes…No one will make out alive. Hurry up and evacuate the plane,” the standard template of the tweet read. Some of the flights mentioned in the tweets had completed their trips while others were about to board passengers.
In the meantime, the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) chief Zulfiquar Hasan met representatives of various airlines and assured the media that security protocols in India are robust and that passengers should fly without fear.
6E11 already reached IST today
— Sourabh Patil (@sforscientist) October 19, 2024
6E17 will reach IST in an hour
6E58 has already reached BOM today
6E108 had already reached IXC today
6E184 has already reached DEL today
Stop your fake bomb hoax and let the aviation industry work with no disruptions.@JM_Scindia
It is interesting to note that the notorious X handle, which made 70% of the total hoax bomb calls to the Indian airlines, is named after Adam Lanza – the mass shooter who orchestrated one of the deadliest elementary school shootings in US history.
On 14th December 2012, 20-year-old Adam Lanza went on a shooting spree at the Sandy Hook Elementary School (the same school where he studied for 4 years), killing 20 children aged between 6 and 7 years.
He also killed his mother, the school principal, two teachers, and two other school personnel. Adam Lanza later took his own life. The motive behind the mass shooting was never found.
The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting occurred on December 14, 2012 in United States, when 20-year-old Adam Lanza shot and killed 26 people. Twenty of the victims were children between six and seven years old, and the other six were adult staff members.
— Creepy.org (@creepydotorg) February 21, 2024
Earlier that day,… pic.twitter.com/15J7cS5Un4
It is all the more alarming that an X handle, which disrupted 46 odd flight operations in India, had named itself after a man who was obsessed with mass shootings.
