Several French Airports Evacuated Due to Bomb Threats

Eight different French airports were evacuated on Wednesday because of bomb threats.

Airports in Lille, Lyon, Nice, Toulouse, Biarritz, Pau, Rennes, and Nantes, were all evacuated around the same time on Wednesday to allow French police to investigate possible threats.

“Lille Airport [is] being evacuated following a bomb threat,” Lille Airport said on social media on Wednesday at around 11 a.m. local time. “State security services are on site.”

Nice Airport, also around 11 a.m. local time, said it was investigating an abandoned bag in Terminal 1, before reopening and returning to normal operations.

All airports have since reopened, but, according to FlightAware and France’s aviation authority DGAC, there are some delays and cancellations as schedules try to recover from the hour or so that the airports were evacuated. Some flights, including at least a couple into Lille, were diverted.

Even as the airports return to normal, travelers should check with their airline before heading to the airport.

The news comes as France remains on its highest alert level after last week’s murder of a schoolteacher in northern France.

The level of alert is not just impacting travelers’ plans at airports. The Palace of Versailles was also evacuated on Wednesday for the third time in five days because of a security threat and the Louvre Museum in Paris was evacuated on Saturday, Oct. 14, also because of bomb threats that turned out to be false alarms.