Armed man takes child hostage at Hamburg airport, police assume custody dispute | Abroad

A high alert has been declared and many troops are on site, including a police special operations unit and police psychologists. Air traffic at the airport was immediately halted, police said. All access to the terminals was blocked. The airport has largely been evacuated.

The armed man rammed his vehicle into a barrier at the Nordtor (North Gate) around 8 p.m. and drove onto the airport platform. He had already shot his gun into the air twice, said police spokesman Thomas Gerbert. According to him, an official specialized in negotiations is in contact with the shooter. He cannot say exactly how the communication takes place, but he can say that it is in Turkish.

According to the police, it is an ‘absolutely good sign’ that the man continues to talk to the emergency services. “He wants to talk to us and we initially assess that as very positive.”

The gunman parked his car under a plane with passengers, who were hastily evacuated, and then threw two burning bottles from the car, “a kind of Molotov cocktails,” the police spokesman said. According to him, they caused no damage and the airport fire brigade was able to extinguish the bottles fairly quickly.

The man’s wife had called the police earlier this evening about a possible child abduction and said he was on his way to the airport. The police said they were assuming a ‘static hostage situation’ on the airport platform. It has now been confirmed that there is a 4-year-old child in the car and that the 35-year-old man is from Stade, about 60 kilometers southwest of Hamburg. According to the police, the wife has now reported to the authorities.

The police assume that a custody dispute is the reason for the hostage situation. The child was with his mother in Stade on Saturday. It is believed the father ‘took’ the child from the mother and possibly forcibly put him in the car before driving to Hamburg airport.

The gunman parked his car under a plane with passengers, who were hastily evacuated, and then threw two burning bottles from the car, “a kind of Molotov cocktails,” the police spokesman said. According to him, they caused no damage and the airport fire brigade was able to extinguish the bottles fairly quickly.

Travelers who were in the terminal were evacuated by buses. All flights have been diverted to Hannover Airport.

Hamburg airport was also closed once in October, but then due to a threat of attack on a flight from Tehran to Hamburg. In July, climate activists from the group Letzte Generation closed Hamburg airport for hours after they cut a hole in the fence, rode their bikes onto the tarmac and stuck themselves there. For safety reasons, flight operations had to be halted for several hours. Thousands of passengers, including many families with children, were affected.