Colombian Airline Resumes Flights to Venezuela After Warplane Scare

Venezuelan warplanes approached a Colombian Avianca airline AVT flight on Friday. The incident caused a diplomatic incident and triggered the airline to stop its flights to and from the socialist country.

Following the cancellation of transport to Venezuela when Venezuelan military aircraft briefly approached a passenger jet flying from Madrid to Bogota on Friday evening, Avianca said it would restart flights on Sunday. The unpleasant episode resulted in diplomatic conversations and Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro ordering an investigation.

Avianca, in a statement on Saturday evening, said, “After clarifications between the governments of Colombia and Venezuela about the incident registered last night in Venezuelan skies with an Avianca plane, the Colombian civil aviation authority has authorized the restart of operations to and from Venezuela,”

History of distrust between the two countries

For years, the South American neighbors have had an unstable relationship. Venezuela’s socialist government every so often charges Colombia of incitement. It also asserts in the other direction that Caracas has backed Colombian guerrillas.

Avianca’s flights were avoiding Venezuela on Saturday as data from online tracker FlightRadar24 showed. Further, a source from the airline company verified that flights to Venezuela had been stopped.

Flight data also showed the Avianca Boeing Dreamliner took a quick turn when coasting over west Venezuela around 2000 local time (2000 EST/0000 GMT) on Friday. This was consistent with a statement about the incident issued by the Colombian defense ministry.

The statement said that defense and foreign ministers of both countries discussed the plane incident. It also said President Maduro personally ordered the investigation on the incident.

Venezuelan warplane on “navigation mission”

During a visit to cacao growers on Saturday afternoon, Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos said that the ministers have spoken and cleared it all up, there’s no need to worry.

The Colombian statement mentioned Venezuelan authorities as saying its warplane was on a “navigation mission”. Venezuelan authorities did not directly respond to a request for comment.

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