A terminal of Budapest Airport was briefly shut down late on Wednesday due to an overheated container carrying an isotope, a spokesman for the Hungarian Disaster Management Authority said, Reuters reported.
“Material damaging to health did not get into the environment,” Marton Hajdu told Reuters, adding that Terminal 2B was shut down to facilitate a fast investigation.
“Passengers are perfectly safe, “ he added.
The terminal was shut between 7.30 p.m. (1730 GMT) and about 10.30 p.m. and eight incoming and eight outgoing flights were affected, Budapest Airport spokesman Laszlo Kurucz told Reuters.
Passengers and crew of the flight that carried the container and passengers at the airport were not in danger, according to information from the Disaster Management Authority, Hajdu added.
The officials did not name the flight or the isotope.
The national news agency MTI said the material was iridium ordered by a Hungarian company from the Russian city of Dimitrovgrad, and the container arrived in Budapest on a flight which arrived in the evening from Istanbul.
Gabor Kaszas, an official of the company, Izotop Intezet Kft, was quoted by MTI as saying that a rise in temperature was normal when such materials are transported.
Izotop Intezet is a company focused on research, development and production of radioisotopes used in healthcare, research and industry.
Officials of the company were not immediately available for comment.