SINGAPORE, march 8 — A Singapore Airlines (SIA) flight from Hong Kong to Singapore was delayed for three hours on February 26 after some of its cabin crew members were found to have breached security procedures.
A spokesperson from Hong Kong International Airport told Channel NewsAsia yesterday that five crew members from flight SQ861 had entered the restricted area at the departures level “without carrying crew permits and undergoing security screening”.
At about 3.40pm that day, airport security reported that three crew members from the flight had breached security.
The flight was supposed to take off at 3.45pm, but it only departed at 6.20pm due to the incident.
It was later found that two other crew members of the same flight had also entered the departures level without crew permits and undergoing security screening.
They subsequently boarded the flight, said the spokesperson.
The police were called to handle the case according to existing procedures.
As part of security procedures, the spokesperson said that passeng TODAY —ers and crew members on the flight were required to go through security checks all over again.
“According to standard procedures, cabin crew arriving at Hong Kong International Airport and departing on the same aircraft under a different flight code (should they choose to leave the aircraft) are required to carry crew permits and go through security screening at the arrival levels before accessing the aircraft via the departures level of the restricted area,” he added.
Responding to TODAY’s queries, an SIA spokesperson said some of its cabin crew members operating the flight were “required to assist airport authorities in an investigation”. However, the spokesperson did not provide further details about the investigation.
“This resulted in additional security screenings, which required the passengers to disembark from the aircraft,” said the national carrier.
“After the checks were completed, the crew members were allowed to operate the flight and passengers reboarded before the flight departed Hong Kong at around 1820hrs local time.”
