Ethiopian Airlines Flight 702 headed from Addis
Ababa to Milan signaled “Squawk 7500,” a radio frequency that
indicates
hijacking. The plane passed Rome, where it was supposed to
stop, and Milan, where the flight was scheduled to end, eventually
landing in Geneva. @matthewkeyslive posted audio purporting to be
someone on the plane requesting asylum in communications with air
traffic control in Geneva. Jaunted.com reports asylum was
negotiated between Swiss authorities (the ones available before 6am
local time), the pilots, and the hijackers while the plane burned
through its fuel over Lake Geneva. It finally landed at Geneva
around 6am local time, and the airport remains closed with flights
diverted to Zurich.
Twitter spent the last few hours pointing out social media was
on ET702 news while the mainstream media wasn’t, though it appears,
according to Twitter, to be being picked up by cable news outlets,
including BBC and CNN. It doesn’t yet appear to be on any of the
major US news websites, including CNN.com. Also via Twitter,
a press release from
Ethiopian Airlines claiming passengers and crew were safe was
pulled from its website. The pilots may have exited via the
windows.
The Swiss,
incidentally, recently voted to restrict the country’s
immigration rules.
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