On June 29, 2020, the police were called to Angelholm Helsingborg Airport (AGH) as a group of people entered the runway, attempting to prevent a passenger plane from leaving. One protester glued themselves to a plane, a message by local police indicated.
The police escorted around ten people from the airport. Five protesters showed up at the airport’s terminal building, while another five had tickets for a flight, and therefore were at the airport legally, the police said.
Nevertheless, the group of people who were in the terminal building is now suspected of causing damage to the interior, while people who prevented the plane from taking off are suspected of violating the Aviation Regulation. Preventing a plane from taking off is illegal.
While the police did not reveal which airline or aircraft were targeted by the protesters, it stated briefly that it was a passenger plane, scheduled to operate a domestic flight. A message by Flgihtradar24.com indicates that it was SAS (Scandinavian Airlines) flight SK2184.
The flight was scheduled to depart from Angelholm for the country’s capital Stockholm (Stockholm Arlanda Airport, ARN) at 7:25 pm local time. Instead, the ATR-72 aircraft (registration number ES-ATB), took off at 9:00 pm, the site’s data indicates.
On June 26, 2020, about 30 Extinction Rebellion activists crossed Paris Orly airport’s (ORY) perimeter to invade the runways. They briefly interrupted traffic on what was the first day of the airport’s reopening.
In October 2019, Extinction Rebellion tried to halt operations at London City Airport (LCY). The protest included James Brown, a former British Paralympian, climbing on top of a British Airways aircraft inside the airport. Another man, who got onboard a flight to Dublin to directly speak to the passengers, attempted to discourage them from flying.
In Sweden, the action is also not unheard of. In July 2018, a 21-year-old activist delayed Turkish Airlines flight from Gothenburg to Istanbul for two hours in order to stop the deportation of an Afghan citizen.