This is the moment armed police surrounded a diverted plane after a bang was heard from the cargo hold at 30,000 feet.

The American Airlines pilot told passengers that a person may have made the noise, causing panic among passengers, Clarin reports.

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Flight AA954 was en route from Buenos Aires to New York on Thursday when it turned around after 400 miles to make an unplanned early landing.

Passengers and crew members reported hearing unusual banging noises coming from the cargo hold where the luggage was safely stowed.

The pilot announced that the plane was returning to Buenos Aires due to a problem, then revealed that a person trapped in the cargo hold hit a blunt object, apparently trying to be rescued.

The cargo hold is not normally accessible during flight and is not used to store live cargo.

Airport security said: “Noises could be heard in the cargo hold, which raised suspicions that something unusual had occurred.”

“The captain cited a safety issue because he heard noises consistent with the presence of a person in the hold.”

Heavily armed police and sniffer dogs were sent on standby to greet the return flight and search for danger.

Footage filmed by passengers on board after the plane landed showed a SWAT team armed with guns and shields entering the cargo hold.

Officers are transported to the aircraft’s fuselage by elevator, which normally lifts luggage.

Once at the top, the officers rushed to film with the passengers in their seats.

Other airport employees could be seen on the ground nearby, witnessing the unusual incident.

However, when the police entered the cargo hold, no one was found there.

They reported: “The hold was opened and the unloading of the baggage containers began, with nothing out of the ordinary seen at this time.”

CAUGHT

A similar incident occurred on a United Airlines flight in 2017 when a baggage handler was trapped in the cargo hold for an hour.

The jetliner was flying from Charlotte, North Carolina, to Washington Dulles International Airport, and the man was stuck in the cargo hold.

When the plane landed on New Year’s Day, the man, who was an employee of an outside baggage handler, was uninjured.

Not only are there none of the safety precautions found in the cabin of an aircraft in the cargo hold, but there are also usually no temperature checks.

“It amazes me how one person’s colleagues could allow something like this to happen when they’re supposed to be monitoring each other,” Paul Thompson, a longtime ramp agent at Denver International Airport, told CNN at the time.

“It is up to my airline’s gate crew to check the interior of the container before closing the door.”

He stressed that a common problem is workers waiting exhausted for their passengers’ luggage and then falling asleep in the luggage compartment for a short “10 to 15 minute” nap.

“We shouldn’t do it, but people do it all the time,” he said.

“I’ve seen it happen quite a bit,” Thompson said.

“If you’re smart about it – if you choose to fall asleep in the bin, stay close to the door and don’t hide in the corner.”

In 2015, this happened to a baggage handler who woke up to find himself trapped on an Alaska Airlines plane that had taken off from Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.

After being in the air for 14 minutes, the plane returned to the airport after the employee called 911 and continually banged on the plane’s partitions.

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