A Turkish Airlines A330 passenger jet that was diverted to Halifax late Saturday night because of a bomb scare has landed safely in Istanbul.

RCMP had earlier tweeted that the aircraft and the passenger's luggage had been searched, and that no explosive device was found.     

The flight, with 256 people aboard, took off from New York City and was rerouted to Halifax where it landed without incident just after midnight local time.

One passenger says it became pretty obvious there were problems a few hours into the flight.

“The route changed. You could see it making a U-turn. So it was pretty clear." 

The plane touched down in Halifax just before 1 a.m.

"The aircraft was past Halifax when the pilot made the decision to divert, and they turned back and came in here," said Peter Spurway of the Halifax Stanfield International Airport. 

Passengers were shuttled away to a secure area while the bomb squad and canine units began searching the aircraft.

The threat reportedly came through social media.

Last week an Air France flight bound for Paris was diverted to Halifax and a second flight was diverted to Salt Lake City, Utah due to "anonymous threats" but nothing was found on either aircraft.

At an international security forum in Halifax this week, Canadian Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan assessed the risk of a terrorist attack in Canada as "medium."

Sajjan says the recent bomb threats are proof Canadians need to be alert.

“We need to remain vigilant. We need to trust in our security from the police all the way to the military and trust in our system to be able to manage the level of threats and we are doing that on a daily basis," said Sajjan.

Turkish Airlines Flight 2 left Halifax around 6:30 a.m. Sunday, arriving safely in Istanbul later in the day.

Five passengers opted not to board the flight.

RCMP were back at the airport just a few hours after clearing the Turkish flight to address another threat against a WestJet flight to Calgary. Seventy-five passengers and crew were asked to evacuate the plane.

No explosive devices were found and the plane took off shortly after.

With files from CTV Atlantic’s Kayla Hounsell, Bruce Frisko, and the Canadian Press.