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Extra security after passenger jacket raises concern

Detained passenger was Saudi woman with Jordanian passport

Passengers of Delta Flight 43 board buses after landing at Cincinnati's airport Tuesday.
Passengers of Delta Flight 43 board buses after landing at Cincinnati's airport Tuesday.

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COVINGTON, Kentucky (CNN) -- A Delta Air Lines flight from Paris landed in Cincinnati without incident Tuesday afternoon after wiring in a woman's heated jacket prompted security concerns in France, U.S. government sources said.

Sources told CNN the woman was a 22-year-old Saudi with a Jordanian passport who was an electrical engineer. These points, and the wires in her jacket, caused the concern, the sources said.

The wires were determined to be part of her electrically heated jacket, U.S. law enforcement sources said.

The woman was not permitted to board Delta Flight 43, but was allowed to take a later flight to the United States, a French police spokesman said.

"Nothing suspicious was found," the spokesman said. "She took the next flight to Cincinnati."

U.S. Homeland Security officials said they asked for a fighter escort because Flight 43 had already left the ground before French officials notified their U.S. counterparts about the incident. A senior U.S. official told CNN the fighter escort was ordered, but was later aborted.

Delta Flight 43 landed at about 3:50 p.m., more than an hour behind schedule, at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport located in Hebron, Kentucky. Passengers were rescreened by airport security before being taken to the terminal. Government sources said there was no person of interest to U.S. authorities on the plane.

The Boeing 767 had 181 passengers and 12 crew members on board, said Delta spokeswoman Catherine Stengel.

Two passengers on the flight said 11 people were taken off the plane by authorities immediately after the plane landed.

They also said that passengers were informed about an hour and 20 minutes into the flight from Paris that there was a "security situation" and they could not leave their seats. Anyone needing to use the restroom had to have an escort, they said.

These two passengers said they did not see any fighter jets.

Last month, security concerns caused six Air France flights to be canceled. On December 24 and 25, three flights did not take off for security reasons. Three other flights did not take place because the cancellations left the aircraft on the ground in Paris.

After three consecutive days of 3.5-hour delays, British Airways Flight 223 left London heading for Washington Tuesday after only a two-hour delay.

The London-to-Washington flight, which was canceled Thursday and Friday and escorted to Washington by fighter jets on Wednesday, departed Heathrow at 1713 GMT (12:13 p.m. ET) and was expected at Dulles International Airport at 8:06 p.m. ET (0106 GMT Wednesday). (Full story)

Passengers on the escorted jet were held on board Wednesday night for several hours while FBI agents questioned some passengers whose names were similar to those on a list of known terrorists.

Six British Airways flights from London to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, also were canceled last week.

CNN's Gary Tuchman, Kelli Arena, Mike Brooks, Kevin Bohn and Terry Frieden contributed to this report.


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