Munich airport disrupted by drones: Flights grounded, thousands of passengers stranded

Germany's Munich Airport was forced into an antithetic shutdown precocious connected Thursday nighttime aft aggregate drone sightings disrupted operations, grounding flights and diverting others successful what has go a recurring situation for European aviation hubs."When a drone is sighted, the information of travelers is the apical priority," the airdrome said successful the statement.The airdrome said successful a connection that 17 flights were grounded soon aft 10 p.m. section time, affecting astir 3,000 passengers. Another 15 incoming flights were diverted to Stuttgart, Nuremberg, Vienna and Frankfurt.The incidental follows akin disruptions past week erstwhile drone sightings led to impermanent shutdowns astatine airports successful Denmark and Norway.Munich had already been connected alert earlier successful the week erstwhile its Oktoberfest festival was concisely unopen aft a weaponry menace and explosives were recovered successful a residential gathering successful the bluish portion of the city.Located successful Bavaria, confederate Germany, Munich Airport is simply a hub for Lufthansa and handled astir 20 cardinal passengers successful the archetypal fractional of this year.Denmark has not straight named who it thinks is down the drone enactment successful its airspace past week, which caused large disruption astatine respective airports.

But Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said, "we tin astatine slightest reason that determination is chiefly 1 state that poses a menace to Europe’s information – and that is Russia.”Europe has been connected alert successful caller weeks implicit repeated drone sightings and alleged Russian drone incursions into NATO airspace successful Poland and Romania, on with claims of Estonian airspace being violated by Russian combatant jets.On Wednesday, European Union leaders supported caller plans to fortify the bloc’s defences against Russian drones.Russian President Vladimir Putin, speaking connected Thursday, joked that helium would not alert drones implicit Denmark anymore. Moscow, however, has denied engagement successful the incidents.