An emergency evacuation was ordered Sunday evening after a passenger on a Frontier Airlines flight overheard a suspicious conversation.
A passenger aboard the flight at Inland Empire’s Ontario International Airport, which was preparing to depart, heard someone say that “he had a bomb in his backpack”.
After the flight crew was informed, the Ontario Police Department responded to the scene at around 10 p.m.
“Officers located and detained the subject in questioning, confirming that he was in possession of a backpack and had no other luggage,” said Ontario Police Department Public Information Officer Denyse Quezada.
Ontario Fire Department and bomb squad also arrived at the scene within minutes. After initial questioning, the suspect told investigators that he was on FaceTime with a friend who was playing an online game.
“The friend was playing a video game called ‘Call of Duty,’ and had just been eliminated by an in-game C4 explosion. The subject’s statement was related to a video game and not an actual explosive,” Quezada added.
Investigators also called the friend on the other end of the line and corroborated the story before the suspect was released.
Passengers aboard the Frontier Airlines plane were evacuated, and the airport was also partially vacated.
“There was a brief incident this evening in T2 related to one passenger. Out of an abundance of caution, the east side of the terminal was cleared and flights were held during the investigation. The investigation is complete and operations are now resuming,” Steve Lambert, an Ontario International Airport spokesperson, said.
A bomb-sniffing K-9 team also swept the plane and surrounding grounds, finding no explosives or signs of danger. All the passengers, except the man who made the statements, were then allowed to board the plane.
The airport welcomed almost 5.3 million passengers over the first nine months of 2026 and is likely to have nearly 7 million passengers over the full year — more than a 65% increase in passenger volumes since 2016 when the airport transitioned to local control.
In September 2026, a total of 582,315 passengers arrived at the Ontario International Airport, and Frontier Airlines carried nearly 10.9% of those flyers on its flights.
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