United Airlines plane makes emergency landing at Heathrow as 'smoke fills cabin'

A United Airlines plane has been forced to make an emergency landing after smoke reportedly filled the cabin mid-flight.

Emergency services scrambled to Heathrow Airport after flight UA949 ditched its flight to San Francisco and returned to London's Heathrow Airport. Police cars and an ambulance were pictured on the runway.

The United Airlines flight took off from the London airport at 12:23 this afternoon. The plane was heading to San Francisco and flight tracking data shows it got near Milton Keynes before turning back. The Boeing 777-200 appears to have stopped climbing at 15,000ft before returning. It comes after a BT warning for anyone who still has a UK landline in their home.

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The same aircraft declared an emergency on approach to San Francisco just seven days ago, according to Air Live. The plane was understood to have had engine issues.

United Airlines told Air Live the maintenance team needs to evaluate a technical issue on the plane before a new departure. The plane was escorted to the gate by three fire trucks. It is understood there has been no wider impact on Heathrow's operations.

This comes after Heathrow Airport revealed a drop in half-year profits despite seeing passenger numbers soar to a record high last month.

The group posted a 37.2% drop in pre-tax profits to £203 million for the six months to June 30 as its costs surged, partly driven by a higher wage bill after last autumn’s budget measures.

But it saw passenger numbers rise to a record 39.9 million in the first half, up 0.3% on a year earlier.

The shutdown of Heathrow in March after a substation fire is expected to have cost the airport millions, its chief executive said.

Asked to estimate the cost Thomas Woldbye told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “That is a number of millions that we are talking about.”

A report into the incident clarified Mr Woldbye had been asleep with his phone on silent as the overnight decision to close the airport was taken.

He said: “I would of course have liked to play that out differently on a personal level. On an operational level, I’m satisfied that our crisis management procedures were in place.

“Of course, an organisation like ours have to be able to manage whether the captain’s on the bridge or not and in this particular case we took the right decisions.

“So on a personal level, of course, frustrating – it’s not how I normally operate – but on an operational level all the right things happened.”

He denied misjudging what it meant to be the head of one of the world’s busiest airports.