bmiBaby PAN call at EGCC

[manxcat]

I was at Manchester Airport this afternoon when bmiBaby 737-300 G-TOYK returned shortly after departure on a PAN call. Flight number was WW3523 departing for Alicante at 1620 and returning to EGCC landing back at 1645.

Met by full RFFS at threshold of 23R and on 23L. Ac came to a full stop on high speed turn off and then taxied back as normal.

No dramas thankfully but wondered what the nature of the PAN call was?

BW.

manxcat.

[OliWW]

"PAN-PAN (http://www.aviation-terms.com/index2.php?sSourceName=53-74-51-98-48-78-87-90-121-108-71-90&sCurrentLetter=P&nTermID=1346)
The international radio-telephony urgency signal. When repeated three times, indicates uncertainty or alert followed by the nature of the urgency".

[manxcat]

OliWW,

Thanks for the reply.

My query surrounded the actual nature of the urgency. I was stood next to a guy with a scanner but he didn't seem to know either. We did hear ATC vector a company ac in before WW3523 "downwind and No 1 to land before the emergency traffic".

manxcat

[RingwaySam]

Smoke in the cockpit apparently.

[manxcat]

Ringway Sam,

Thanks for clearing up the mystery. Glad it turned out well - could have been nasty.

manxcat

[crispey]

There's an interesting plot of this on www.openatc.com (http://www.openatc.com).

Seems they got to somewhere near Brum at FL240 then turned back up towards Derby before returning.It also looks like they made it out OK a couple of hours later