Once again, this was an urgent situation. Late at night on March 10, I received a telephone call assigning me to write about the story of the "hijacking attempt of China Southern Airlines flight CZ6901 on March 7." "This story must be in this issue!"  said the voice on the telephone. Oh my God! The cutoff would be Wednesday morning. I knew nothing about this incident, and I had only 24 hours left. There ere more than 200 passengers on that airplane and they are somewhere out there amongst the hundreds of millions of Chinese citizens. Our goal was to find these eyewitnesses in order to report what happened. This looked like searching for a needle in a haystack.

Recently, I seemed to be involved with the subject airplane hijacking. I had just worked on one story last week about hijacking.

So I started to think. I have two fellow alumni who are working at two different airports. I can try to contact them first thing tomorrow morning. Another former colleague is now working in a key position at a web portal and he can locate people through a blog over there. Another current colleague has a younger fellow alumnus working at China Southern Airilnes and he can ask too. That night, I sent an SMS to that former colleague and expressed my hope that he would publicize this as a "major incident" for a blog. At this point in time, I still had not established a blog at that website.

Early morning on March 11, I established a blog that my former colleague highlighted in bold red on the front page of the portal. The title was <Southern Weekend is urgently seeking passengers on China Southern Airlines flight CZ6901 on March 7>.  I posted my mobile telephone number there.  Meanwhile, my fellow alumni gave me the bad news -- they were not present at the Urumqi, Lanzhou or Beijing airports and therefore they did not read the so-called <Internal notice> from the Civil Aviation Administration. But I was able to find a clue from the Internet -- over at the Shumu Community forum, a netizen with ID "Luckie" had posted from Zhongchuan airport in Lanzhou on March 7 and described his experience during more than ten hours there.

So I asked a fellow alumnus for his Shumu ID and password and I sent Luckie an email. I prayed that he would agree to be interviewed.

A colleague then sent an SMS with the name and mobile telephone number of a first-class passenger on CZ6901 that day. The colleague said that the standard procedure is to retain information about passengers for only three days. Therefore, this fellow alumnus friend would ordinarily not have that information. But this particular passenger had reserved and extra ticket and that was why his information was retained. The heavens were helping me!

I called that number immediately. The voice over there was hesitant: "How did you find my number?  It is not appropriate for me to speak. The relevant authorities will disclose the information. It is not appropriate for me to speak ..." I tried emotional and rational persuasion for more than ten minutes. This passenger was steel-willed and refused to talk. I hung up the telephone in extreme disappointment.

It was 12:11pm. Half a day had gone by already. Suddenly an unfamiliar telephone number appeared on my mobile telephone.  But the person hung up after one ring.

I called back. The other party said: "I was on that airplane. I read your blog."

Oh my God! I had just published my blog post at 9:04am. In less than three hours, the person that I was looking for found me. I was astonished by and grateful for the speed of modern communication methods.

The following is the narration from that person:

On March 7, the airplane was scheduled to depart at 10:30am. The airplane was delayed for about 10 minutes. At that time, everybody was on board, so we must be waiting for the permission to take off. The flight was normal thereafter.

After flying for about an hour, a passenger said that there was the smell of gasoline. The attendant also smelled it because it was too strong.

We were flying on a Boeing 757 that day.  The plane was not big, and the rest rooms were present only between the first-class cabin and the economy cabin. There were more than 200 passengers. The airplane was not full, because there were two empty rows in the rear.

I was seated towards the back, and I heard a quarrel. An Uyghur woman about 20 years old was on her feet.  This Uyghur woman was seated towards the front to my right. She was probably in the fourth or fifth row of the economy-class cabin.

A man went over there. My guess was that he was the security guard. He held her down and found a bottle. He removed the bottle and then escorted her to the restroom.

We had no idea what was happening. There was no announcement.  During the entire process, there was no chaos. It was very calm.  At least I felt very calm. Someone in the rear slept through the whole thing without being aware at all.

At past noon, we began to feel that the airplane was descending. An announcement came that there was an emergency situation and the airplane was going to land at Zhongchuan Airport in the city of Lanzhou. A few minutes after that announcement, the airplane touched ground.

According to the flight schedule, the airplane was to land at 2:05pm. But it landed in Zhongchuan airport at 12:46pm.

<Southern Metropolis Daily> reported that that the National Civil Aviation Administration issued an internal urgent notice that the suspects had intended to ignite combustible material inside the restroom in order to blow up the airplane. However, the airplane staff uncovered the plot.

There were two suspects. The notice said that the preliminary investigation showed that there were major gaps in airport security in Xinjaing which almost allowed a tragedy to occur.

After the airplane landed, the Uyghur woman was taken away.

Xinjiang Autonomous Rule Region chairman Nur Bekri was attending the two Congresses in Beijing.  He said that the unscheduled landing was due to "people attempting to create an air disaster." He said: "Based upon what is known at this point, there was an attempt to create an air disaster.  Fortunately, the airplane crew took decisive action. They discovered the plot in time and prevented the action. This incident just occurred. We are investigating who these people are, where they came from, what their purpose is and what their backgrounds are."

After the airplane landed, netizen Luckie's post mentioned: "The airport personnel said: We cannot let a single suspect go to Beijing. We must get to the bottom of this in Lanzhou."

The earliest post from Luckie was posted at 6:10pm on March 7. The post appeared at the New Express area of Shumu Community. The post said: "I was flying from Urumqi to Beijing. Halfway there, someone was found to be carrying gasoline and behaving oddly. The airplane was forced to land in Lanzhou. The police took away four Uyghur persons (note: this remains to be confirmed). We went through a new round of inspection at the airport. Many people were interrogated. We have been waiting for six hours already. We don't know when we can leave.  Everybody is extremely agitated. What rotten luck!"

Periodically, Luckie would use his notebook computer and wireless card to post from the airport.

When asked "if the airport inspection did not discover it, then how was it uncovered on the airplane?" the explanation at 6:20pm was "the bottle was opened on the airplane and many people smelled gasoline. That traveler took the gasoline into the restroom and remained there for a long time."

Then at 6:20pm again: "They are registering information about everybody right now. I don't know if I can get back to Beijing today ... the female passenger who carried the gasoline had used perfume to cover up the smell. It must have been intentional."

"I am lucky to have escaped," reflected Luckie.

6:53pm: "It's been six-and-a-half hours. Everybody has been registered. They said that they have to issue new tickets to us. I don't know if we can leave today. More than 200 people are stuck here. They are not even providing decent service."

8:38pm: "it's been eight hours already.  They just distributed rice boxes. This matter has alarmed the public security bureaus of several provinces as well as the National Security Ministry. Supposedly, four cans of gasoline were found."

8:49pm: "Among the four individuals were foreigners, who are believed to be Eastern Turkestan elements."

9:04pm: "We have been on the ground for eight-and-a-half hours and we are not going anywhere. I guess we won't make it back to Beijing tonight. The airport personnel said: We cannot let a single suspect go to Beijing. We must get to the bottom of this in Lanzhou."

11:22pm: "Eleven hours have gone by. They are still taking down statements from people. Through our strong insistence, they have provided Chinese chess sets and poker cards. I don't know if they intend to keep us here overnight."

11:32pm: "It was obviously a case of careless inspection, but we get to suffer."

As Luckie wrote, the obvious problem was just how several cans of gasoline got through airport inspection. There was not much technical subtlety with this type of method.

The information showed that since May 1, 2007, the China Civil Aviation Administration has required that all domestic airline passengers may carry not more than 1 liter of non-alcoholic liquid when they travel. The liquid must be inspected before being allowed.

On May 7, 2002, a China Northern Airilnes McDonnell 82 airplane was flying from Beijing to Dalian. At 20 kilometers to the east of Dalian airport, that airplane plunged into the sea. The investigation showed that a passenger brought inflammable liquid onto the airplane. As the airplane got ready to land, the liquid caught flame and the airplane went out of control.

On February 5, 2003, the Civil Aviation Administration issued the <Public Notice from the Chinese Civil Aviation Administration concerning the regulations on passengers bringing fluid onto civilian airplanes>. The rules require rigorous inspection of the liquid brought by passengers in order to ensure safety in the skies.

Nevertheless, the new rules of 2007 were still unable to prevent this case from happening.

During the two Congresses, China Civil Aviation Administration chief Li Jiaqiang was interviewed by the media and said the fact that the airplane eventually landed safely with all passengers showed that the overall safety measures in air transportation in China are rigorous.

He said: "Over the past years, the safety level of Chinese civilian aviation is amongst the world leaders.  We have the ability to guarantee air transportation safety across our vast country."

The information that I obtained later from Beijing airport was that CZ6901 landed there at 6:02am the next morning.

That day, I also contacted a colleague working in Lanzhou media. He explained the entire process by which Zhongchuan airport handled the case and even had some photographs.  But he needed to consider whether the information ought to be disclosed.  The Southern Weekend editors also contained an anti-terrorist expert in China. Other colleagues did their best to locate persons close to the incident.  But none of this matters anymore, because on the afternoon of March 11, this story was aborted for reasons that everybody knows about.

What a pity!

Latest news: Today, China Southern Airlines chairman Liu Chaoyong said that a female passenger came out of the restroom and passed by the attendant who detected a suspicious smell. The attendant alertly sensed that the smell was suspicious.  Then she smelled the scent of perfume and gasoline in front of the restroom. The attendant immediately searched the restroom and ultimately found an inflammable substance inside the garbage bin of the restroom.

The attendant notified the airplane security guard immediately. Based upon the how the female passenger spoke and acted, they realized that the male passenger next to her was her companion. The two individuals were isolated. The airplane crew then moved the suspicious substance into the special container for handling such materials. The airplane was forced to land in Lanzhou airport. The two suspects were taken away by the police.

Liu Chaoyong said that the preliminary analysis was that the two individuals intended to stow away the inflammable material and then take action at the appropriate moment. Fortunately, the attendant uncovered the plot in time.