A Lower Plenty man has been arrested and charged with radio interference at Tullamarine Airport after he was accused of illegally accessing aviation radio networks to transmit chants and false mayday messages.
Australian Federal Police nabbed the 45-year-old suspect after executing a search warrant at his home at Lower Plenty on Saturday, September 21.
Officers discovered four handheld radios, along with associated equipment which was used to transmit the interference. Two mobile phones seized during the raid were found to have recordings of the chants and Mayday messages on them.
The AFP believes that the man had been interfering with radio networks at the airport since August, although the police were only brought in to investigate in September after receiving a report from the Australian Communications Media Authority.
The man has been charged with one count of radio transmission capable of prejudicing the safe operation of an aircraft, one count of operating a radio communications device without a licence, and one count of using a transmitter that interfered with radio communications in a way that was prejudicial to the safe operation of an aircraft.