Two British men detained in Spain over plane bomb hoax

Spanish police detained two British men Friday who falsely claimed they had a bomb on a flight from Manchester to Tenerife in Spain’s Canary Islands, police said.

The two men, who are in their 20s and who reportedly appeared to be drunk, claimed to have a bomb just as the plane was landing at the Reina Sofia airport on Tenerife, the largest of the Canary Islands, a police statement said.

“At the request of the crew, police entered the plane and indentified two passengers as the alleged authors of the fake bomb alert and immediately detained them,” it said.

The Thomas Cook flight was carrying 218 passengers and eight crew members, online news site Canarias7 reported.

The two arrested men displayed “significant symptoms of intoxication”, the website added.