Wife calls in airport bomb threat to halt fleeing husband

A woman has admitted phoning in a bomb threat that sparked sharply raised security at Geneva Airport in a bid to stop her husband from leaving.

The false alarm caused hours of traffic chaos at the busy airport on the French-Swiss border after Geneva police received information of the call from their French counterparts.

Police forced traffic to a standstill as they conducted individual vehicle checks. Credit: Reuters

Cars were halted for inspection by police while passengers were subject to additional checks and warned of delays as they arrived at departures.

Police meanwhile raided an address after tracing the call that was put into Swiss customs at the airport, that is commonly known as Cointrin Airport.

"Yesterday in the evening, a woman called Swiss customs at Geneva airport," the Geneva prosecutor's office said in a statement.

The delays lasted several hours before the woman admitted her threat had been fake. Credit: Reuters

"She said that today a person carrying a bomb would be in the French sector of the airport."

But after being confronted by officers she admitted her real motive.

"They found a woman who admitted to having made the call and explained that she wanted thereby to prevent her husband from leaving," the statement added.

It remains unknown whether the woman's call prevented her husband from boarding his plane.