Imagine for a moment that you’re sitting aboard a plane at a refueling stop en route to Vienna from Sydney. To kill some time, you send a text message to your spouse telling her that the plane has been hijacked by Islamic terrorists. Pure comedy right? Apparently this type of joke isn’t such a knee-slapper in Austria where an Italian man was arrested for sending such a message.

The impressive part of this story is that authorities in Australia, Italy, Kuala Lumpur and Austria were able to mobilize very quickly to address this threat. Within twelve minutes they had contacted the pilot of the aircraft and ascertained that there was no hijack in progress. As for the joker who sent the message, he was later freed since he really meant no harm by his prank. No charges were filed.

via engadget