Miami International Airport Terminals Evacuated
UPDATE: Miami International Airport reopened early Friday morning after a passenger was detained and a suspicious item was spotted, airport officials said.
Most of the airport was closed for hours as a bomb squad team dealt with the suspicious item, which inspectors found when screening a checked bag.
A passenger was in law enforcement custody, the Transportation Security Administration said in a statement early Friday morning. Authorities did not provide details about whether the passenger had been charged or what investigators found.
All concourses of the airport except for Concourse J had been closed before the situation was resolved, police said.
Concourses E and F were evacuated at 9:30 p.m. Thursday after the item was found, said Greg Chin, a Miami-Dade Aviation Department spokesman. Authorities rerouted arriving flights to other parts of the airport.
Investigators from Miami-Dade Police, the Transportation Security Administration and the Department of Homeland Security responded to the incident, the Transportation Security Administration said in a statement. Airport roads were also closed “to ensure public safety,” the statement said.
The incident brought the usually bustling Miami airport to a halt for hours.
On the eve of a busy Labor Day weekend, and with the holiday expected to have a heavy load of traffic, a suspicious package was found at Miami International Airport.
The dreaded “suspicious package” was being taken very seriously. Obviously it is better to err on the side of caution. Let’s just hope that it wasn’t a bomb. A bomb squad investigated a report of a suspicious package after police evacuated four of six concourses at Miami International Airport for several hours on the eve of the Labor Day travel period, an airport spokesman said Friday.
Police bomb squad authorities went about 9:30 p.m. Thursday to a Customs area of Concourse E near an international arrivals area when the initial report came in, airport spokesman Greg Chin told The Associated Press.
He said between 100 to 200 passengers were evacuated while police investigated and that flights overnight were allowed to use parts of two concourses still open.
Chin declined to elaborate on the nature of the suspicious item and referred all calls to the Miami-Dade police. Police did not immediately return repeated telephone calls for comment.
“I’m still not sure how many flights came in during this time, but any that did were relocated to the eastern or western ends of the airport,” Chin said early Friday.
He said parts of Concourse D and J remain open to flights, but all four of the middle concourses in the 2-mile-long airport complex remained closed to the public for hours.
“We’re just waiting hopefully for an all clear,” Chin said.
He said most of the passengers still in the concourses were initially taken outside.
“We had to have passengers moved out on the curbside,” he said, adding most of those returning to the build were allowed into the areas of the two concourses still open. Police have evacuated two terminal sections at MIA after a suspicious item was found.
According to Miami-Dade Police Department, they received a call at around 9 p.m. about a suspicious item found inside a luggage in the customs area at Concourse E, Thursday night.
Police have evacuated passengers and employees at Concourse E and F. “We were literally getting the boys ready because of a long day of traveling, trying to put them down then I heard someone knocking on the door and we opened it and it was the Miami Police saying, ‘Just grab your room key and head across the street,’” said a passenger.
Two flights have been affected and are being diverted from Concourse F to Concourse J, and will then clear Customs at J.
The Bomb Squad along with officials are on the scene investigating.
Four concourses at Miami airport evacuated because of ‘suspicious’ item AP View full sizeAlan Diaz / Associated PressA Miami-Dade police officer escorts passengers out of the terminal at Miami International Airport in Miami …
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Official: 4 Miami airport concourses evacuated By WSBT 24/7 News MIAMI (AP) — A spokesman for Miami International Airport says four of its six concourses have been evacuated as a police bomb squad …
Official: 4 Miami airport concourses evacuated MIAMI — MIAMI (AP) – A spokesman for Miami International Airport says four of its six concourses have been evacuated as a police bomb squad investigates a …
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