Flights at Japan’s 2nd largest airport canceled — after scissors vanish

Passengers had to deal with hundreds of delayed flights on Saturday — because of a pair of scissors.

A pair of shears went missing in a Japanese airport, causing security checks to be suspended for about two hours, local outlets reported.

The scissors were missing from a store in the departure lounge of New Chitose Airport in Hokkaido, the country’s second-busiest airport for passengers last year, according to Japanese broadcaster NHK.

Japanese airline ANA warned passengers on X, formerly Twitter, about the holdup, noting that flights could be delayed or canceled due to security checks.

According to the BBC, 36 flights were canceled and 201 were delayed. Security checks and flights did eventually resume that day, even though the scissors were not found by then.

Those who already went through security had to go through again, creating long lines, the BBC reported, and passengers were already dealing with the chaos of traveling after a Japanese holiday, Obon.

Meanwhile, national newspaper Nikkan Sports reported two days after the scissors went missing that they were found by a worker in the same store where they went missing.

The found scissors announcement was delayed because the airport needed to confirm that they were the same pair as the missing scissors, according to NHK.

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism asked Hokkaido Airports to investigate the incident in order to prevent it from happening again.

“We recognize that this occurred as a result of insufficient storage and management systems at the store,” Hokkaido Airport told the BBC. “We are aware that this is also an incident that could be linked to hijacking or terrorism, and will once again work to ensure thorough management awareness.”