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Flying on Spirit Airlines, for anyone who has been paying attention over the past few years, is a crap-shoot. You never know what you will see or how the experience will go.
Many people would rather drive for hours than subject themselves to the possibility of being trapped on a Spirit Airlines flight, and with good reason. But, apparently, not everyone.
We now know this because last week a 23-year-old man was arrested after allegedly being so angry that customer service agents wouldn’t let him get on board on his Spirit Airlines flight when he arrived late to the gate that he called in a bomb threat.
The man, John Charles Robinson, had been booked to take Spirit Airlines Flight 2145 out of Detroit. That is also the flight that he allegedly claimed a bomb was going to be on when he called the airline.
According to the United States Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of Michigan, “at approximately 6:25 am, an individual later identified as Robinson, used a cellphone to call into Spirit Airlines and conveyed false information about a bomb threat to Flight 2145 departing from Detroit Metro bound for Los Angeles.”
“During the call, Robinson stated in part, ‘I was calling about 2145… because I have information about that flight,’ and ‘there’s gonna be someone who’s gonna try to blow up the airport,’ and ‘there’s gonna be someone that’s gonna try to blow up that flight, 2145.'”
He then allegedly described the person who would “be carrying a bomb through the TSA,” adding, “they’re still threatening to do it, they’re still attempted to do it, they said it’s not going to be able to be detected. Please don’t let that flight board.”
As a result of his alleged bomb threat, the Spirit Airlines flight was canceled, passengers and crew were deplaned, and bomb sniffing dogs and FBI agents were deployed. Robinson was later arrested by FBI agents when he returned to the airport to take a different flight to Los Angeles.
“The alleged bomb threat prompted a coordinated response by our FBI Detroit Joint Terrorism Task Force, in partnership with the Wayne County Airport Authority Police Department and the U.S. Federal Air Marshal Service, leading to the arrest of John Robinson as he attempted to board another flight at Detroit Metropolitan Airport,” said Cheyvoryea Gibson, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Detroit Field Office.