Swiss airline aborts flight to Beirut

By Timo Kirez

GENEVA (AA) - The Swiss International Air Lines has aborted a flight to Beirut due to safety concerns and landed in the Austrian capital Vienna, the local daily 20 Minuten reported on Friday.

According to the report, the Airbus A220-300 was already over Bosnia-Herzegovina after an hour's flight when the decision to abort the flight was made on Thursday night.

The situation in the Lebanese capital had changed during the flight, an airline spokeswoman told 20 Minuten.

"Our experts have come to the conclusion that the situation in Lebanon is difficult to assess at this time and have decided to take this step out of caution," the spokesperson said.

The report said there were 138 passengers and five crew members on board the plane.

According to Flightradar24, the online service for real-time positioning of aircraft, flight LX224 was originally scheduled to return to Zurich.

However, it headed for Vienna instead, as Zurich Airport had no longer granted permission to land.

"We hope for the understanding of the affected passengers and are doing our utmost to get them back to Zurich as quickly as possible," the Swiss spokeswoman also said.

She explained that it is currently unclear whether the diverted flight to Beirut will also have consequences for the route to Tel Aviv.

"Here, too, we are monitoring the situation very closely and are in close contact with the relevant authorities," the spokeswoman added.

The daily also reported that there has been unrest among Swiss flight attendants since the resumption of flights to Tel Aviv and Beirut.

According to the report, many are afraid of flying to the war zone and are therefore signing off.

The so-called flight cancellation clause in the airline's collective labor agreement makes this possible, it noted.

However, as up to two employees per flight have signed off, the airline recently changed the regulations, the report said.

Employees must now inform the airline of their concerns at least seven days before departure, the daily added.