Embassy of Qatar: AP Image
Federal air marshals confronted a passenger who had apparently lit a cigarette in an airline lavatory on Wednesday night, leading NORAD to scramble two fighter jets and a phalanx of law enforcement officials to meet the plane, United Flight 663, when it landed at Denver International Airport.
But there was no immediate indication of terrorism. A federal official speaking on condition that he not be identified by name said that the passenger had gone to the bathroom to smoke a cigarette, claimed he had diplomatic immunity and made sarcastic comments that the marshals took as a threat.
"The situation here is not like the shoe bomber on Christmas," the official said, referring to the passenger on an Amsterdam-to-Detroit flight who is charged with trying to set off a bomb in his underwear, not his shoe.
On Wednesday, the flight, a Boeing 757 en route from Ronald Reagan National Airport, with 157 passengers and a crew of six, landed safely. Law enforcement officials quickly isolated it and took the passenger into custody.
The plane left Washington at 5:33 p.m. Eastern Time and landed in Denver about 6:50 p.m. Mountain Time.
After the cockpit crew requested that the plane be met by law enforcement, the North American Aerospace Defense Command scrambled two F-16 fighters from Buckley Air Force Base, in Colorado, to intercept the plane. They escorted it for the last five minutes of its flight.
Initials reports said the passenger might have been trying to set something on fire. But several law enforcement officials said no explosive had been found on the plane. Still, the man was being questioned by the FBI, as were fellow passengers, and the investigation was continuing, they said.
The Associated Press reported that the man was a Qatari diplomat.
A Department of Homeland Security official, speaking on background, said it appeared the man had been smoking a cigarette in the bathroom, had tried to cover it up and then had made an "unfortunate comment."
NBC News reported that a half-hour before landing, the air marshal smelled smoke and confronted the man as he emerged from a bathroom. The man said he had been trying to set his shoes on fire, the report said.
One man aboard the plane, Scott Smith of Laramie, Wyo., called his wife, Jayne, on her cell phone and told her what had happened. Jayne Smith, who had flown separately to Denver from Washington, said her husband sounded more annoyed than scared. "He just said some guy in first class had a temper tantrum and he might have tried to set something on fire."