LONDON — A British Airways jetliner flying from London to Chicago descended 28,000 feet in just seven minutes Monday after declaring an emergency due to an unspecified “technical problem,” the airline said.
The Boeing 777 took off at 12:15 p.m. local time (7:15 a.m. ET) but made the descent just 30 minutes later while flying over Ireland, according to flight tracking site FlightAware.
It turned around and spent about four hours zigzagging across the Bristol Channel, a waterway in the west of England, before landing at London’s Heathrow Airport at 5 p.m. local time (noon ET).
“The aircraft landed safely after our highly trained pilots returned to Heathrow following a technical problem,” British Airways said in an emailed statement. “Customers have disembarked as normal and our teams are working to get their travel plans back on track as quickly as possible.”
Heathrow did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Passengers will likely be accommodated in hotels by the airline until another flight can be arranged, as stipulated by the UK Civil Aviation Authority.
Britain’s National Air Traffic Service (NATS) was put under scrutiny last month after two technical problems in the space of two weeks caused significant delays at several UK airports and hundreds of flights were cancelled.
NATS blamed the delays on software issues, leading to criticism of the service from several major airlines.
Britain’s Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander also acknowledged the situation was “deeply frustrating” for passengers.
With 84.5 million passengers last year, Heathrow ranks as the seventh busiest airport in the world, according to data published by the Airports Council International.
Travel from Heathrow was severely disrupted in March last year when a massive fire at an electricity substation caused a pre-dawn power outage at the global transport hub.
The closure affected more than 1,300 flights and 200,000 passengers.
After reviewing 600 pieces of evidence linked to the substation, the national energy system operator ruled out suspicious activity in a report saying an avoidable moisture fault caused the fire, leaving almost 70,000 homes without power.
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