Thomas Cook Airlines Removed 5 'Disruptive' Britons From Vegas-Bound Plane

A Thomas Cook Airlines flight from U.K.'s Manchester to Las Vegas, Nevada was diverted to Winnipeg in Canada on Saturday morning due to five unruly passengers. The five Britons were removed from the plane after they engaged in disruptive behavior while the plane was mid-air.

“We can confirm that five disruptive passengers were offloaded,” a representative for the U.K.’s Thomas Cook Airlines said on Saturday.

The Winnipeg Airport Authority earlier said the plane, an Airbus A330 flying from Manchester, England, was diverted to Winnipeg around 11:15 a.m. (6:15 a.m. EDT) on Saturday morning due to a medical emergency. Emergency crews and Royal Canadian Mountain Police (RCMP) attended to the aircraft when it landed.

However, Thomas Cook later clarified the flight did not have a medical emergency but was diverted to Winnipeg due to the unruly passengers.

A Thomas Cook Airlines spokesman said: “Flight MT2924 from Manchester to Las Vegas on Saturday was diverted to Winnipeg in Canada as result of disruptive passengers.”

“Five passengers were offloaded in Winnipeg. Our flight then continued to Las Vegas with a delay of 2 hours 40 minutes,” the spokesman added.

The spokesman for Thomas Cook also said they could not disclose further details of the incident as it was being investigated by the RCMP.

An RCMP representative told Canada's Winnipeg Sun that the five adults were arrested by police, who were assisted by the Canadian Border Services Agency, after the plane landed. The Britons were accused of mischief and causing a disturbance on board the plane.

“None of the males resisted officers and all were escorted off the plane in handcuffs without incident,” the representative said in an email to the local news outlet.

A video from the incident, posted on social media, shows the five men being escorted off the Thomas Cook plane. While the men were being removed, one of them shouted and swore at other passengers. The five men have not been identified yet.

Tyler MacAfee, director of corporate communications and public affairs at the Winnipeg James Armstrong Richardson International Airport (WAA), claimed that the initial report they received from the traffic control tower was of a medical emergency on the aircraft.

“But my understanding is that, at the same time, there were some passengers causing a problem,” MacAfee said. “My understanding is the passengers were quite unruly. They ended up being taken off the aircraft.”

MacAfee added that every aircraft had built-in contingency plans detailing the places a plane could possibly land in case of an emergency. He said that Winnipeg’s airport is large enough to accept such emergency landings.

MacAfee also stated that the Thomas Cook aircraft was deiced and refueled after it landed at Winnipeg. The plane later took off for its scheduled destination to Las Vegas on Saturday afternoon.