(CNN) Police surrounded a JetBlue plane at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport Tuesday after a false alarm about a hijack incident was sent. 
 
 JetBlue Flight 1623 was lined up on the taxiway at the airport waiting to depart when it "experienced a radio equipment problem," the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement. 
 
 The plane, which was bound to Los Angeles, sent out a hijack code notifying air traffic control that there was a security threat onboard after controllers couldn't make contact with the pilot, according to a law enforcement source with direct knowledge of the incident. 
 
 There is a special code pilots must select using the aircraft's transponder to indicate such an emergency, the law enforcement source said. 
 
 Alexa Curtis, a blogger who was aboard the flight, said she was terrified when she realized something wrong could be happening. 
 
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 A JetBlue airliner, about to take off from JFK on... 
 
 A JetBlue pilot accidentally reported that his plane was being hijacked at JFK, triggering a massive response of cops and firefighters who surrounded the craft on the tarmac, officials said. 
 
 The pilot of Flight 1623, bound for Los Angeles, tried to punch in the code alerting JFK’s tower that the craft’s radio wasn’t working – but inadvertently hit keys that signaled a hijacking, law enforcement sources said. 
 
 So without verbal contact with Flight 1623 and the manually entered code for a hijacking, authorities at JFK had no choice but to assume the worst. 
 
 Port Authority police, its Emergency Services Unit, K-9 units, firefighters and ambulances all rushed to the scene. 
 
 “That brought everyone and their mother out to the tarmac,” a law enforcement source said. “Most people (cops and firefighters on the scene) have never responded to a hijacking, other than in training.” 
 
 The incident caused a ripple effect of delays in landings and departures as first responders rushed on to the runway. 
 
 “The aircraft was inspected and cleared with no security threat,” Port Authority spokeswoman Lenis Rodrigues said. 
 
 Flight 1623, with 158 people on board, was scheduled to leave at 7:30 p.m. and land at 10:52 p.m. at LAX. It finally took off at 11:23 p.m. and was expected to touch down at 2:28 a.m. in Los Angeles. 
 
 The flight was expected to take off later Tuesday night. 
 
 JetBlue spokeswoman Paula Acevedo declined to answer questions about the communications snafu – but did call it a “false alarm.” 
 
 “Shortly before departure, Flight 1623 from New York JFK to Los Angeles experienced a radio issue impacting the crew’s ability to communicate and a false alarm was sent to JFK tower,” she said in a statement. 
 
 “While communication was reestablished via alternate channels, authorities responded in an abundance of caution. The aircraft was cleared and returned to the gate for inspection.” 
 
 Passenger Tony Schwartz tweeted: “I am on a JetBlue flight at JFK that lost its communications. Created a security crisis. 10 heavily armed cops boarded plane and just left. After 1.5 hours on runway being towed back to gate. Wow.” 
 
 Additional reporting by David K. Li
– Some 150 passengers waiting to take off from New York's JFK Airport got quite the scare Tuesday when a pilot accidentally triggered a hijacking alarm. "Woah. My worst nightmare," passenger Alexa Curtis tweeted alongside photos of authorities surrounding and searching JetBlue Flight 1623 ahead of departure to Los Angeles. "Honestly thought we were going to die." Though passengers were apparently kept in the dark, the Airbus 321 had "experienced a radio equipment problem" while taxiing, according to the FAA. A pilot then entered an incorrect code, which triggered a hijack alert, per CNN. No security threat was detected and the flight departed four hours late, per the New York Post.