E-mail threat stops air traffic

Flight operations at Kenai Municipal Airport were interrupted for about one hour Tuesday morning while authorities investigated an e-mail threat later determined to be not credible.

As part of its airline policy, Era Aviation instructed one of its commercial flights to return to Anchorage during the investigation, and one Grant Aviation flight did not take off, according to Kenai Police Chief Chuck Kopp.

Nothing out of the ordinary was found and no injuries were reported.

The airport received the e-mail threat at approximately 10:15 a.m., said Rebecca Cronkhite, airport manager, and police and “other appropriate agencies” were notified.

Kopp said the e-mail threat did not appear to be credible and the source of the e-mail is being investigated by the FBI for any possible further action.

By 11:15 a.m., all airport operations returned to normal.

Kopp would not give specifics about the content of the threat, but said in terms of a reason for it, “the range of possibilities is anywhere from an organized group trying to see what our response would be, to an individual prankster.”