A FIRE alert forced a military plane to make an emergency landing at Newcastle Airport.
Five planes had to circle for about an hour on Thursday as firefighters investigated the incident aboard the RAF VC-10, which had five people on board.
The crew of the plane discovered smoke in the cockpit when they were about 100 miles east of Newcastle on Thursday night.
The crew managed to extinguish the fire before landing at 8.30pm.
The airport was shut while firefighters secured the plane. Hundreds of people were left waiting for family and friends on other flights.
Margaret Fletcher, from Wallsend, was on a flight back from Paris. She said: "The crew did not seem to have any idea what was going on themselves, some people did start to panic."
A spokeswoman for Tyne and Wear Fire Brigade said: "We attended a fire call to the aircraft which was returning from a refuelling trip. The fire was extinguished in flight by the crew using extinguishers.
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