Nuremberg Airport Shut Over a False Hijack Alert, Here’s What You’re Owed If Your Flight Was Delayed or Diverted

If your flight in or out of Nuremberg was delayed or diverted on Tuesday 13 October, the airline owes you care and a way to your destination, but probably not EU261 cash compensation. A security closure is normally treated as an extraordinary circumstance, which removes the cash payment but not your other rights.

What happened at Nuremberg airport

Germany briefly closed Nuremberg airport and scrambled fighter jets after a Corendon flight from Corfu appeared to signal a hijacking. Police spokesman Michael Petzold told AP that authorities received a code from the cockpit suggesting a hijacking and could not reach the crew by radio, so they assumed the worst.

Corendon told AP the code went out over Croatia because of a brief fault in the radio communication system, and that no emergency occurred. The aircraft landed safely, and police cordoned off the airport as a precaution, according to dpa. Aviation tracking site Simple Flying reported the flight as XR456 and said Flightradar24 showed dozens of Nuremberg delays and a few cancellations during the disruption. Those are tracker counts, not official figures.

Are you owed EU261 compensation?

Probably not. EU261 pays €250 to €600 for arrival delays of three hours or more, but not when extraordinary circumstances cause the delay. The European Commission’s Your Europe guide lists security risks and air traffic management decisions as examples of such circumstances.

The airline must show that the closure caused your delay and that it could not have been avoided. A flight that was late for a separate reason, such as a late-arriving aircraft, can still qualify. Our guide to extraordinary circumstances explains how airlines argue this.

What the airline must still give you

The airline must give you meals and refreshments in proportion to your wait, plus two free calls or emails. The care trigger is a departure delay of two hours on flights up to 1,500 km and three hours on most longer intra-EU flights. If your new departure is the next day, it must also provide a hotel and transfers.

These care duties apply even when compensation does not. Keep every receipt if the airline does not provide the service on the spot. Our flight rights guide covers how to claim costs back.

If your flight was diverted to another airport

If you landed at a different airport, the airline should cover transport between that airport and the one you booked. Any delay is measured from your arrival time at the original airport or the destination you agreed to. Reported diversions that day included flights headed for Stuttgart, Munich, Memmingen and Prague.

If the airline strands you, you may be entitled to be rerouted on another carrier. See cancelled flight rebooking for the wording to use. Strike pay is a separate question, covered in strike compensation rights.

What to do if you are travelling through Germany this week

Authorities across Germany are on heightened alert for drones. Reuters and AP both reported that Germany blamed Russia last month for an August explosives-laden drone attack at Leipzig/Halle airport, which Russia has denied. Build a longer connection into any German itinerary, and book one ticket rather than separate flights so the airline must rebook you.

Travel insurance may reimburse missed-connection costs, but check that the policy covers security closures. If you are weighing a longer escape from airport queues, our guides, such as the 9-day Annapurna Base Camp trek, run in the mountains instead.

Cover photo: Flughafen Nürnberg GmbH via Wikimedia Commons (Attribution). Section photos: Abdel Rahman Abu Baker via Pexels (Pexels licence); Leon Aschemann via Pexels (Pexels licence); Gustavo Fring via Pexels (Pexels licence); dongfang xiaowu via Pexels (Pexels licence); Tristan via Pexels (Pexels licence).