On Saturday, HB-IHX, operated by Edelweiss Air, had to make a stopover at Graz Airport for an unusual reason. The Airbus A320 was on its way from Larnaka to Zurich.
On board, a Russian citizen locked himself in one of the toilets and did not want to leave it. Even repeated requests from the cabin crew could not convince the man. The captain then decided on a safety landing in Graz, Austria.
According to the police, there were a total of 134 people on board the HB-IHX. The 51-year-old Russian is said to have fully cooperated with the executive and was able to continue his journey to Zurich after extensive checking of his luggage. However, he no longer boarded the Airbus A320, but switched to rail.
The police also took a closer look at the toilet of the Airbus A320 and could not find any abnormalities. Why the Russian locked himself in the toilet and strictly refused to leave it remains unclear. In any case, based on the results of the investigation, the executive assumes that it should not have a "bad" background.
The captain of the HB-IHX must have had the date in the back of his mind, because the incident occurred on the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. Here he obviously did not want to take any risks and decided to make the safety landing in Graz, Austria. Passengers as well as crew and aircraft are in good health and flight WK371 was able to resume after the official act of the police had been completed.