Passengers on the plane headed to Allentown, Pa., from Clearwater were delayed about an hour. Federal and local agencies are investigating.
By JANETTE NEUWAHL
Published August 10, 2004
LARGO - The Pinellas County Sheriff's Office and the FBI are investigating a bomb threat that delayed 75 passengers bound for Pennsylvania on a Southeast Airlines flight Saturday evening. But a search of the plane netted no explosives.
Saturday night, a man called a pay phone at the St. Petersburg-Clearwater International Airport and warned of a bomb on Southeast Flight 732, which was scheduled to leave at 7:10 p.m for Allentown, Pa., deputies said.
A person at the airport picked up the phone and alerted a Transportation Security Administration official.
The official took the phone and clarified the threat before ordering all the passengers off the plane.
It was not known whether the person who answered the phone was a traveler or an airport employee.
The travelers were taken to another area in the terminal while a canine bomb detective team scoured the airplane and its luggage.
The team found no bombs aboard the twin-engine jet, and the passengers were delayed for about an hour, said Mac McMullen, spokesperson for the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office.
The passengers were allowed back on the plane, which took off without further incident.
Deputies said the bomb threat might been made by the boyfriend of a woman aboard the plane to prevent her from leaving the state, McMullen said.
The woman, Maylee Pearl Rossi, 19, was arrested by deputies at the airport on unrelated charges. During their interviews with the passengers, deputies learned that there were warrants out from Polk and Osceola counties for Rossi's arrest.
She was arrested Saturday on two charges each of burglary, grand theft and defrauding a pawn shop in Polk County and driving without a license in Osceola.
Rossi remained at the Pinellas County Jail without bail, awaiting transfer to a jail in Polk or Osceola counties, law officials said.
The FBI and the Sheriff's Office are conducting a joint investigation into the bomb threat. FBI officials declined to comment Monday on details on whether they were seeking a suspect.
