Wizz Air Luton–Sofia flight diverted to Budapest after bomb threat; nothing found

A Wizz Air flight from London Luton to the Bulgarian capital, Sofia, diverted to Budapest on Monday 2 November after a bomb threat was received during the flight. This report draws on Index, HVG, BBC News, Euronews and dnes.bg. ## The diversion Flight 4302 left Luton at 08:33 GMT and was due in Sofia at 13:25 local time, but landed at Budapest Liszt Ferenc International at 12:09 local time (11:09 GMT, 9.39pm ACDT), the BBC reports, citing FlightAware. Euronews, citing Flightradar24, says the plane was over Bosnia and Herzegovina when it turned towards Hungary. Hungarian Defence Minister Romulusz Ruszin-Szendi said on social media that NATO's air defence duty service ordered an alert and a Hungarian Defence Forces Gripen took off within minutes and escorted the airliner to Budapest, HVG and Index report. The fighter then returned to its base at Kecskemét and police took over, he said. Index reports that firefighters, police and counter-terrorism officers met the aircraft and one runway was closed. ## Checks completed Wizz Air said the plane taxied to a designated stand, where authorities carried out the necessary security checks on the aircraft and passengers. The inspection was "completed and nothing was found", the airline said, according to the BBC; dnes.bg also reports that no threat was found. In a statement carried by Index and HVG, the airline said passengers would wait in the terminal after further security screening and the flight would continue to Sofia once a new crew was available. HVG says the airline did not detail who might have been behind the threat.