Thousands of passengers traveling to the US piled up in Canadian airports after terrorist attacks in New York and Washington prompted US authorities to halt all air traffic there.
Rasmi Simhan and her family left Bombay, India, headed for the Washington, DC, when the pilot of their Northwest Airlines flight told passengers an unspecified "emergency" in the US had halted all commercial flights.
"All we were told is that there was some sort of emergency and that there were no flights in or out of the United States," said Simhan, 20, after finally landing Tuesday at the Mirabel charter and cargo airport outside Montreal.
The news brought silence in the cabin, said Simhan.
"There was an odd calm," she said.
Her flight was one of more than 100 bound for the US that instead headed to Canada.
"Until further notice, all air movements from Canadian airports are grounded, except for those flights required for urgent humanitarian purposes, and diversions by the FAA of international aircraft previously destined for the United States," Transport Minister David Collenette announced.
In the US, pilots and air traffic controllers managed the logistical nightmare of safely grounding hundreds of planes in US skies.
Dozens of airplanes were diverted to Kansas airports following the attacks on New York's World Trade Center and Pentagon. One Kansas county declared a state of emergency as a small Garden City airport struggled to provide transportation, food and lodging for 180 stranded passengers on three grounded commercial planes.
"We had to pull some tricks out of our hats to get everybody accommodated," said Andrew W. Perry, director of aviation at Garden City Regional Airport.
About an hour after Captain Jay Meinen's Boeing 737 took off from Cleveland, an air traffic controller told him, "Divert the plane. You are not flying to Los Angeles anymore. Please prepare to land at Indianapolis. This is a national emergency."
The plane descended minutes later at Indianapolis International Airport.
At Mirabel, Simhan said buses arranged by airport officials then took them to Dorval, the city's main terminal for commercial flights, and on to hotels or other places to stay for the night.
On Tuesday night, Montreal officials made a public plea for help in finding lodging for about 1,000 people expected on flights still coming in to Mirabel or Dorval.
Other airports accepting unscheduled flights were the Canadian military base at Goose Bay in Labrador; Saint John's, Newfoundland; Moncton, New Brunswick; Halifax, Nova Scotia; Toronto; Vancouver, British Columbia; and even Whitehorse in the Yukon Territory.
The Canadian military was put on alert and major government and tourist sites were closed, including Parliament Hill in the capital, Ottawa, and the tall CN Tower in Toronto. The US Embassy was closed and under increased security.
Some border posts temporarily closed, but reports that the entire frontier would be sealed proved untrue.
Erin Wayne and her parents were flying back from Scotland to New York on Tuesday when the flight was diverted to Montreal's Dorval airport due to what the pilot called "a tragedy."
The family took a taxi to the border and walked across, luggage in hand, to search for a ride to Syracuse, New York.
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