BERLIN — A drone carrying explosives was found near a runway at Germany's Leipzig/Halle Airport and the device was defused, authorities said Wednesday, with Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt calling the incident a "new threat scenario" and a "new quality of danger".
Both runways at the major freight hub were closed and several flights were diverted after a flying object was sighted near the airport shortly before midnight Tuesday.
Regional police and prosecutors said an airport employee discovered the drone near the airport's south runway with "an unknown explosive device". Police examined the object with an anti-explosives robot and removed its detonator.
"Drone sightings and drone threats, including in a hybrid context, are something we know from the past," Dobrindt told reporters at the airport after interrupting his vacation to travel to the scene. "That a drone armed with explosives is at an airport is a new threat scenario."
Dobrindt described the incident as a "hybrid attack scenario" but said questions about the explosives, the origin of the drone and who was behind it were part of the ongoing investigation.
