Bomb threats prompt military plane escorts for two US airline flights to land safely in Atlanta

Bomb threats against two US airline flights prompted North American air defence fighter planes to scramble to accompany them to their destination in Atlanta, Georgia.

The planes landed safely at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport on Saturday, no bombs were found aboard either, and the airport has returned to normal operations, said airport spokesman Reese McCranie.

Threats against Delta Air Lines flight 1156, coming from Portland, Oregon, and Southwest Airlines flight 2492, from Milwaukee, had been deemed credible, McCranie said. Several media outlets reported that a Twitter user going by the name Zortic wrote of planting bombs on the two planes, stating in a message to a Delta Twitter account, "I have a bomb on one of your planes, but I forgot which one when I left the airport. Can you help me find it?" Those tweets have been deleted.

The North American Aerospace Defence Command scrambled fighter jets from McEntire Joint National Guard Base in South Carolina. A pair of fighter jets accompanied each aircraft as it landed.

The incident comes five days after bomb threats were made against two other Delta flights. One was arriving at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York from San Francisco, and another was departing the New York airport for Tel Aviv.