A pilot has been fired after he apparently fell asleep at the controls whilst flying a passenger plane from New York to Rome. The cockpit couldn’t be reached for ten minutes by air traffic controllers, initiating an emergency terrorist hijacking alert.

The Italian airline ITA Airways left New York on April 30. French authorities became concerned there was no response from the plane for 10 minutes as it was flying over French airspace, according to the Italian newspaper Repubblica.

Concerned at the prolonged silence the French reportedly warned Italian authorities that the Airbus A330 could be hostage to terrorist hijackers.

Italian authorities contacted ITA, which successfully managed reach the pilots via their satellite cell phones.

ITA speculated that the captain and the co-pilot had fallen asleep for a short time while at the controls in the cockpit, the newspaper reported.

The co-pilot was within their rights to take a “controlled rest” which is permitted under a certain protocol. But (obviously) the captain should have been awake during this period.

The newspaper also reported that the pilot denied any wrongdoing and claimed there was a failure in the communications system which meant he couldn’t reply to French authorities, Repubblica reported.

The plane landed safely in Rome Fiumicino.

ITA told The Telegraph that passenger safety wasn’t compromised during the incident.

ITA Airways is the new state-owned flag carrier, established out of the reorganisation of bankrupt Alitalia.