Six French airports were partially or completely evacuated this morning due to bomb alerts, in a context marked by the increased risk of attacks in the country due to the crisis in the Middle East and the allegedly jihadist attack last Friday at a high school in the city of Arras. According to the France Info station, the evacuations affected the airports of Nice, Beauvais, Lyon, Toulouse, Lille and Nantes due to threats received by email.
Nice airport assured in a statement that it was "only an alert for a suspicious package, something frequent, which required the establishment of a security perimeter. But everything was within order." The airport indicated on its .
For its part, a spokesperson for the General Directorate of Civil Aviation (DGAC) confirmed on Wednesday morning "bomb threats" and "terminal evacuations" at four airports - Lille, Lyon, Toulouse and Beauvais (north of Paris). - unable to immediately give further details. Three others experienced significant delays shortly after midday: Toulouse-Blagnac (two hours on arrival, one and a half hours on departure), Lille-Lesquin (one and a half hours on arrival and departure) and Beauvais. -Tillé (almost two hours from departure).
At Bron airport, a business airport located near Lyon, "doubts have been dispelled and traffic has resumed," the airport management clarified. Lille airport indicated shortly after 11:00 local time (9:00 GMT) that it was evacuating its facilities due to "a bomb alert."
In recent days, these types of situations have multiplied in museums, stations and schools throughout the country. On Tuesday the Palace of Versailles was evacuated, something that was already done on Saturday, when the Louvre Museum in Paris was also emptied of visitors and staff and also in the French capital the Gare de Lyon, one of the largest train stations.
On Monday morning, the Gambetta high school in Arras, where a teacher had been stabbed to death by an Islamist terrorist, was also evacuated due to another bomb alert, which also left three other workers at the center injured.
The French Government has mobilized 10,000 police and gendarmes after having raised the anti-terrorist alert to the level of emergency attacks, which has also meant that the law enforcement forces receive the support of 7,000 soldiers from the Sentinel mission.
