Plane grounded at Iran airport over concerns about its flight plan. On September 5th, a charter plane flying to Dubai was grounded at an airport in Bandar Abbas, Iran because air traffic controllers deemed the flight plan submitted by the pilots was outdated. The Boeing 737 owned by FlyDubai was carrying 140 passengers, 100 of them were Americans. Rumors quickly started circulating that the Iranian military forced the jet to land. But the U.S. State Department rapidly issued a statement explaining that the flight was rerouted, so it could change its crew and that the matter had been resolved.
A plane that was grounded in Iran for three hours last week prompted wild speculations on the internet.
On Friday, flight FZ 4359 left Bagram airbase in Afghanistan for Dubai. The plane had a total of 140 passengers on board, 2 were Canadians and 100 were Americans.
For an unknown reason the Fly Dubai charter plane left the airbase three hours late. While over the Iranian airspace, the pilots were told by ground monitors of aircraft that they needed to land the commercial jet.
The pilots obliged and grounded the plane at an airport in Bandar Abbas, an Iranian city on the Persian Gulf about 900 miles to the southwest of Bagram.
When media outlets all over the world started reporting on the grounded plane, social media was flooded with theories on the story.
Some claimed that aircraft was hijacked. Others stated that ISIS or al-Qaeda were involved.
Few even said that the charter plane was forced to land because of the Iranian military.
But all of these rumors were quickly dismissed with a statement issued by the State Department that revealed as shocking as it might be, Iran and America were working together to solve the matter.
The official said that the private carrier was rerouted to an airfield in southern Iran “because of a bureaucratic issue” and went on to elaborate:
“Contrary to press reports, this plane was not forced down by the Iranian military. The issue appears to have been resolved and hopefully the plane will be able to take off soon.”
The flight was diverted at around 3 p.m. ET because the airline failed to refile a flight plan with Iranian authorities.
Mohammad Ali Ilkhani, head of the Iranian Airports Organization, explained that they were unaware that American contractors were on the flight.
Ilkhani gave the real reason why the plane was grounded by explaining that since the pilots left Afghanistan behind of schedule, they were supposed to rectify their flight plan and change crew because they had exceeded their flying time limit.
Officials first asked flight FZ 4359 to go back to Afghanistan, but when the pilots explained that they did not have enough fuel to do so. They were authorized to land in Iran.
Ilkhani went on to share that once on the tarmac, the pilots acknowledged their errors and corrected them. The plane stayed at the Iranian airport for over three hours.
All passengers and baggage were transferred to a second plane sent by Fly Dubai.
The new aircraft with fresh crew members along with all 140 passengers took off at around 3 a.m. Saturday morning, local time to its original destination.
The State Department confirmed that the plane landed safely in Dubai just before 3:40 a.m.
The event was viewed as something extraordinary because the United States of America and Islamic Republic of Iran cut diplomatic ties in April 1980.
In November of 1979, Iranian students occupied the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days.
