SpiceJet Flight SG-2 Sent Alarm Bells Ringing In Pakistani Airspace

The Pakistan air force swing into action on seeing Kabul bound commercial flight from New Delhi in its airspace. It pressed to jets into action to escort the commercial out of its airspace.

What was the commotion in Pakistani airspace?

The Pakistani aviation authorities failed to recognize the scheduled commercial flight’s call sign and took a passenger airplane to be a military jet. It was a SpiceJet plane flying from New Delhi to Kabul that entered the Pakistani airspace on a scheduled flight. It all happened amid rising tensions between India and Pakistan on September 23.

What was the incident?

SpiceJet flight SG-2 was flying over Pakistani airspace when the Pak authorities took “SG” to be an Indian Air Force aircraft. And they took no time in sending two F-16 jets to escort the Boeing 737 with 120 passengers on board. The PAF jets could see that it was a commercial flight but they order the plane to come to a low altitude and escorted the plane to Afghanistan airspace.

How did the passengers react on seeing PAF jets?

There was nervousness in the plane. The passengers were frightened on seeing F-16s. They were asked to roll down the widow panes to avoid contact with PAF jets. But nothing untoward happened and the SpiceJet flight exited the Pakistani airspace safely. On return, the same flight was delayed for five hours to complete the paper work and obtain permission of Pak authorities to fly safely from their airspace. The flight didn’t report any untoward incident on return.

Source: https://bit.ly/2pvxw7J

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