An Alaska Airlines flight crew issued a security alert March 13 after three Mexican Orthodox Jews began praying with tefillin.
The flight attendants, who were concerned by the prayers being said aloud in Hebrew and the unfamiliar boxes with leather straps hanging from the passengers, locked down the cockpit and radioed a security alert ahead to Los Angeles International Airport.
The flight originated in Mexico City. It was met at the Los Angeles airport by fire crews, foam trucks, FBI agents, Transportation Security Administration personnel and police, according to Reuters.
The men were escorted from the plane and questioned, then released to catch connecting flights with no charges filed.
The mistake follows an incident in January 2010, when a US Airways flight from New York to Louisville was diverted to Philadelphia after a 17-year-old passenger’s tefillin were mistaken for a bomb. — jta