WATCH: Passengers flee plane after 'bomb' note found in toilet
Passengers have spoken of the horrifying moment they were told to “get out, run, run, run” after a man left a threatening note on plane, reportedly saying "bomb".
The 42 passengers on board the Virgin flight from Sydney to Albury were forced to jump more than a metre from the plane onto the tarmac after being told by cabin crew to run as soon as the plane landed.
The man allegedly responsible for the note remained in police custody for the day before he was charged on Tuesday afternoon.
The 30-year-old was charged with sending a document threatening death or grievous bodily harm and giving false information.
One passenger on the 8.05am flight said they were urgently evacuated as soon as the plane landed at Albury Airport on Tuesday morning.
"As soon as we landed the cabin crew started yelling 'Get out, run, run, run'," the passenger said.
He said the passengers were assembled on the tarmac and police then arrested a man wearing a red jacket and red hat.
"The man didn't seem to resist the arrest."
Officers asked the passengers if anyone had any issues with the man and spoke to the people who had been seated near him.
Another passenger told 7 News they had "to jump out of the window".
"They said evacuate, evacuate, leave all your belongings and they tore the window things out of the side of the plane and we had to jump down out of the window," she said.
Another passenger said police acted extremely quickly in detaining the alleged offender.
"Police jumped to action and had the alleged offender undercover straight away, up on the fence, and we were pushed away from him until they were sure he was unarmed," she said.
A Virgin spokeswoman said it appears "get out, run, run, run" was said by a passenger caught up in the commotion, rather than the cabin crew.
The arrested passenger was said to be calm throughout the flight and got up and went to the bathroom once.
Sydney retiree Wendy Willett was sitting in the aisle opposite the arrested man and described the ordeal as “terrifying”.
“People were making a few comments like “who’s been a naughty boy,” but then the air hostess started shouting to jump out the windows and run,” Ms Willett told News Corp.
“It was really scary, I was worried I wouldn’t be able to jump, but they said the police would help and catch us, which they did. There was another older woman and she looked really shaken up.”
She was flying to Albury to visit family and said passengers didn't notice anything was wrong until the plane landed and they saw swams of police.
“As soon as we were out the police tackled the man and shoved him against the fence and cuffed him.
“He kind of gave them a shrug, like he was saying “what I have I done”, but didn’t resist arrest.
“The police did an excellent job they were very quick and assured us afterwards.
“You could hear the fear in the air hostess’ voice when she yelled, but she was very calm.”
She said the man jumped out of the plane with the rest of the passengers and that he behaved rather normally throughout the flight.
“He looked like he might have been a tradie,” she said.
