A Frontier Airlines passenger was released after investigators verified his “bomb” remark came from a video game call, not a real threat.
Ontario Police Department Public Information Officer Denyse Quezada said officers detained the man Sunday night at Ontario International Airport in Southern California’s Inland Empire. The flight was preparing to depart around 10 p.m. When another passenger overheard him say “he had a bomb in his backpack” and alerted the crew.
Quezada said officers found the man carrying only a backpack and no other luggage. Ontario Fire Department and a bomb squad arrived within minutes of the police response.
“The friend was playing a video game called ‘Call of Duty,’ and had just been eliminated by an in-game C4 explosion. The subject’s statement was related to a video game and not an actual explosive,” Quezada added.
Investigators called the friend on the other end of the FaceTime call and corroborated the story before releasing the suspect. The friend had been playing the online shooter when the in-game death prompted the remark that another passenger overheard.
A bomb-sniffing K-9 team swept the plane and surrounding grounds but found no explosives or signs of danger. Passengers aboard the Frontier flight were evacuated, and the east side of Terminal 2 was cleared while flights were held.
“There was a brief incident this evening in T2 related to one passenger. Out of an abundance of caution, the east side of the terminal was cleared and flights were held during the investigation. The investigation is complete and operations are now resuming,” said Steve Lambert, an Ontario International Airport spokesperson.
All passengers except the man who made the statements were eventually allowed to reboard the plane. The partial terminal evacuation and flight delays lasted through the duration of the investigation before normal operations resumed.
Ontario International Airport has seen substantial growth in recent years, welcoming almost 5.3 million passengers through the first nine months of 2026 and projecting nearly 7 million for the full year. That would mark more than a 65% increase in passenger volumes since 2016, when the airport transitioned to local control. Frontier Airlines carried nearly 10.9% of the airport’s 582,315 passengers in September 2026.