Rony Alexander Gomez-Alberto was arrested after a bomb threat today on United Airlines Flight 2174, after police said he allegedly claimed to have a bomb and tried to enter the cockpit before the plane landed in New Orleans. The Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office made the arrest after the Monday night flight reached Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport.
United Airlines Flight 2174 had left New Jersey for New Orleans, and United Airlines said it landed safely after a passenger disturbance. That sequence leaves the arrest, the landing, and the immigration response tied to the same flight, with ICE lodging a detainer for Gomez-Alberto on November 10, 2026.
Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office Arrest
DHS said Gomez-Alberto was accused of attempting to enter the cockpit, while local reporting cited booked charges of communicating false information of planned arson and terrorizing. DHS separately listed bomb threat, terroristic threat, and disorderly conduct offenses in its statement. The different charge descriptions point to the same core allegation: a midair disturbance that authorities treated as a threat serious enough to end with an arrest on the ground.
The detention also carried an immigration step. DHS said ICE lodged a detainer after the arrest, meaning Gomez-Alberto remained the focus of both local law enforcement and federal immigration authorities after the flight reached New Orleans.
DHS and ICE Detainer
DHS said Gomez-Alberto had previously been apprehended after illegally entering the United States near El Indio, Texas, in September 2011 and near Columbus, New Mexico, in October 2014, and was removed from the country after both encounters. Border Patrol arrested him again after an attempted illegal entry near San Ysidro, California, in 2019, and ICE released him from custody in January 2020 after an immigration judge ordered his release pending removal proceedings.
The strongest remaining question is the exact sequence inside the cabin that led crew and authorities to treat the episode as a bomb threat. What is clear is that the flight continued to New Orleans, the arrest followed on landing, and federal immigration authorities moved the case the next day with a detainer on file.
On November 10, 2026, ICE lodged a detainer for Rony Alexander Gomez-Alberto, a criminal illegal alien from Honduras, with Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office after he attempted to gain entry to the cockpit during a flight.
