B.C. pilot charged with hijacking and terrorism over Vancouver flight

VANCOUVER — A man charged with hijacking a light plane at Victoria International Airport and flying it to Vancouver had an “ideological motive to disrupt airspace” and seized control of the aircraft after threatening a flight instructor, RCMP said Wednesday.

A spokeswoman for the Public Prosecution Service of Canada said a charge of hijacking had been filed in Richmond, B.C., constituting a “terrorist activity” and a “terrorist offence” under two sections of the Criminal Code.

RCMP said Shaheer Cassim, 39, is set to appear in court next Tuesday.

A man with the same name is a former commercial airline pilot based in Victoria who has previously been involved in climate activism, and social media photographs of that man resemble the person arrested on the runway at YVR.

Landings at YVR had been halted for more than half an hour on Tuesday afternoon as the Cessna 172 circled at a low altitude in the airspace above the airport.

In 2012, Cassim held a news conference in Victoria at the start of a cross-country bicycle trek to raise awareness of global warming.

Cassim said at the time that he was a commercial pilot. He used to work for KD Air, a now-defunct airline that was based in Qualicum Beach on Vancouver Island.

The former owners, Lars and Diana Banke, sold the airline years ago. They said in an interview that Cassim was one of the smartest and best pilots they ever had, but that he believed the world was ending.

Lars Banke estimated Cassim flew for KD Air for “just over a year.”

“He was a good pilot,” Banke said, adding that he was only vaguely aware of the hijacking incident, having seen something on YouTube.

“He was really, really, smart,” he said. “His intelligence was a problem.”

Banke said Cassim got bored and left his pilot job to go to medical school. The couple described him as a caring person, but they hadn’t known him to be religious.

“I would say he has a care for the planet,” Lars Banke said. “He’s in no way an evil person, anyway. I mean, he was gonna be a doctor … and then he was gonna be a farmer because he thought the world was gonna end, so I mean he might not be the most stable.”

The couple said they’d heard from Cassim about two years ago, getting a phone call about a potential visit, but nothing came of it, and they hadn’t heard from him since.

The Cessna at the centre of Tuesday’s scare had taken off just before 1 p.m. from Victoria airport, where a spokesman said the aircraft was operated by the Victoria Flying Club.

Flight radar shows it flew straight to Vancouver’s airport before circling for about 25 minutes.

Police said it landed at YVR at about 1:45 p.m., and social media videos show a swarm of police vehicles closing in on the taxiing plane, before the bearded pilot emerges and walks backwards towards officers who train their weapons on him.

Norad confirmed on Wednesday that it scrambled F-15 fighter jets in response to the alleged hijacking.

A spokeswoman for the North American Aerospace Defence Command said additional F-18 fighters were also being readied to respond, but the Cessna landed before those planes were deployed.

“I can confirm that the civilian pilot landed his aircraft before the fighters intercepted it,” she said. “So, an interception did not occur because of the aircraft landing.”

A recorded conversation involving a Vancouver air traffic controller suggests the alleged hijacking may have been motivated by “some type of protest.”

In the conversation, which is part of an online archive of air traffic recordings, the grounded pilot of a commercial jet asks why his plane is being held at the gate.

An unidentified air traffic controller responds that a Cessna is circling about 500 feet over the airport in an apparent protest, and the situation could last “a couple hours,” although the Cessna landed about 10 minutes later.

The controller and the grounded pilot also discuss when such an incident last occurred, and one of them is heard saying, “Maybe the ’70s.”

Another recording of a radio conversation between airport operations for arrivals and departures that occurred while the aircraft was circling above says the suspect “expected to be arrested.”

The incident resulted in what YVR called a 39-minute “ground stop” for arrivals.

Vancouver air-traffic control first mentioned a “rogue aircraft” shortly after 1 p.m. on Tuesday, asking nearby aircraft to keep an eye out for the Cessna and to inform controllers of any need to “manoeuvre as necessary.”

The Victoria Flying Club said no details could be shared due to an active and ongoing investigation “with numerous factors still being assessed.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 16, 2025.

Darryl Greer and Chuck Chiang, The Canadian Press