BREAKING: Turkish Airlines flight diverts to Canada after bomb threat

A bomb threat forced a Turkish Airlines flight from New York City to Istanbul to divert and land in Canada, police said.

Halifax Stanfield International Airport said on its Twitter feed early Sunday that Flight 2 with 256 people on board had landed safely and that police were at the scene.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Nova Scotia said on its Twitter handle that it would not comment on the details of the threat and was looking to identify the person or persons responsible. It added that police will be "searching the Turkish Airlines plane using police dogs trained in explosives."

The RCMP said the bomb threat was received at 10:50 p.m. local time. Flight tracking sites show the flight had already taken off from John F. Kennedy International Airport by then.

Last Tuesday night, Air France Flight 55 from Dulles International Airport outside Washington was diverted to Halifax after an anonymous bomb threat was phoned in after the plane had taken off. An FBI statement late Tuesday said authorities had investigated and found no credible threat, and the RCMP said investigators found no evidence of an explosive device.

That threat came after the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris that killed 130 people and heightened security concerns worldwide.

- AP