On September 11th, a KAL flight off the coast of Alaska was nearly shot down by U.S. Air Force jets that were scrambled to track all flights in the air over North America. The KAL crew didn't respond to multiple attempts to make radio and visual contact, but the U.S. pilots, perhaps knowing exactly who they were dealing with, showed considerable restraint.
To protect major Canadian cities from the remote possibility that there was a terrorist angle to the whole thing, the plane was ordered to land in Whitehorse, Yukon -- the most remote airport in the area that could accommodate a 747.
Some of you might remember the famous photos of the 747 on the tarmac at Whitehorse -- the aircraft was larger than the airport's terminal building. The Korean passengers spent three days there, and by the time they left they had pretty much emptied every clothing store in the town.