Bomb threat diverts Russian airliner

VOLGOGRAD, Russia, Oct. 3 (UPI) -- A Russian airliner had to make an unscheduled stop in Volgograd Sunday due to a bomb threat, aviation officials said.

The Yak-42 airliner had just taken off from Moscow for Grozny with 73 passengers aboard when the airport received a telephone call advising a bomb was aboard.

"The plane's crew took a decision to make emergency landing," a spokesman for the Federal Air Transport Agency told the RIA Novosti news agency.

RIA Novosti said a bomb squad met the plane and began scouring it for any sign of a bomb. The search was ongoing at press time, Novosti said.