Air traffic will remain suspended this Sunday “until further notice” while a police operation is underway. A man sought refuge on the tarmac as part of a likely family conflict.
Traffic at Hamburg Airport remains blocked this Sunday, November 5, in the morning due to a hostage situation on the tarmac after a child was allegedly kidnapped by his father as part of a family conflict, local authorities said.
“The police operation continues, air traffic will remain suspended until further notice,” said the management of the northern German airport early this morning on its X account (formerly Twitter).
“We have mobilized police psychologists and are currently talking to the perpetrator; we are relying on a negotiated solution,” police spokeswoman Sandra Levgrün told NDR.
She called it a “very good sign” that the father had remained in contact with the authorities “for so long.”
Two shots
On Saturday evening around 8 p.m., the armed man drove his car through an airport gate and onto the tarmac, shot twice in the air and threw two burning bottles, a type of Molotov cocktail, from the passenger compartment, a police spokesman said.
Police said they believe a custody dispute was the cause of the incident.
According to police, there was a father and his child in the car. The daily newspaper Bild states that the man is 35 years old and a Turkish citizen and that the child is a little girl aged four. Police said the negotiations took place in Turkish.
His wife’s warning
The wife of the driver of the car had previously alerted the police to the child’s abduction, a police spokesman said.
The father fled in his vehicle at the foot of a Turkish Airlines plane.
17 flights planned in Hamburg with 3,200 people on board had to be diverted on Saturday evening. In principle, 286 flights with 34,500 passengers are planned for this Sunday.