Munich Airport Opens Amid Laptop Security Alert

Police are still looking for the man whose laptop set off a security alert at Munich's airport on Wednesday.

Photo: Munich Airport Opens Amid Laptop Security Alert

About 1,200 police fanned out to search the airport's Terminal 2 building Wednesday afternoon and evening after a security device flagged a man's computer as possibly containing explosive material.

The man left the scene soon after, and authorities have not been able to find him. Now they say he was likely a passenger running to catch his plane, and not a threat. An airport spokesman told news agency AFP that such a false alarm can be triggered by harmless chemicals such as perfume.

The airport was closed for approximately three hours but has since reopened.

At around 3:30 pm, an airport security device had alerted officials to possible explosives in the laptop, but the man then proceeded through security control with his laptop before officials could take a second look, Deutsche Welle reports.

According to Bloomberg, police closed part of Munich’s Terminal 2 for about three hours yesterday afternoon after the man’s laptop set off an explosives alarm at a checkpoint, delaying more than 100 outbound flights. The man grabbed the computer, ran into the departures area "and vanished in the crowd" before security officers could stop him, German Federal Police said in a statement early today.

It’s not clear whether the laptop contained explosives and the scare may have been a false alarm, federal police spokesman Albert Poerschke said yesterday. Camera images of the man will help authorities determine what happened, de Maziere said.

"There’s video of the gentleman,” de Maiziere said. “When we’ve reviewed it, we’ll be able to determine how people were being checked."