A Qatar Airways Boeing 777 inbound to Manchester Airport (MAN) was intercepted by two Royal Air Force Typhoons on Friday evening after the aircraft stopped responding to air traffic control (ATC) over central England. Flight QR23 from Doha Hamad International Airport (DOH) was in the final stretches of its journey from Qatar when the incident took place.

The UK’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) has confirmed that a Quick Reaction Alert (QRA) was launched, with an RAF spokesperson adding that the flight was “causing concern to civil authorities.” The situation was resolved, and the widebody landed safely in Manchester without any further incident.

RAF Fighter Jets Scrambled To Qatar 777 Over England

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The two fighters intercepted the Qatar Airways jet over Nottingham before escorting it across the Midlands and Yorkshire before its landing in Manchester. Both the MoD and Qatar Airways have confirmed the incident, although neither specified the nature of the concern. The airline’s statement does not address it directly, instead stating that the flight was escorted following a “security notification from UK authorities.” The 777-300ER touched down at Terminal 2 shortly before 20:00 BST and was not met by emergency services.

Multiple reports state that the Qatar aircraft temporarily lost communications with ATC, likely due to a technical issue onboard. An unresponsive commercial aircraft in UK airspace is treated as a potential security concern, triggering a QRA involving fighter jets sent to intercept the plane and attempt to re-establish communications. An RAF spokesperson stated,

“We can confirm that an RAF Quick Reaction Alert was launched for a Qatar Airways flight which was causing concern to civil authorities. The incident was resolved and landed safely at Manchester Airport.”

Additional Reports Suggest A “Threat” Onboard

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While most reports of the intercept attribute the response to a loss of communications between the Qatar jet and the ATC, the UK Defence Journal has suggested that the intercept was related to “an incident in which a threat had been made.” It added that the nature of that threat and whether it was assessed as credible has not been established.

The report also noted that open-source tracking indicated the 777 was not responding to controllers and had not begun its descent into Manchester where expected. Simple Flying has reached out to Qatar Airways for further clarification on this incident, but a spokesperson could not be reached before publication.

The same Qatar Airways flight, QR23, was involved in a notable QRA incident back in August 2014 after a hoax bomb threat was made by a passenger onboard. RAF Typhoons escorted the Airbus A330 into Manchester before the individual was arrested by police. Flights in and out of the airport were suspended for around 25 minutes on that occasion.

Lost Communications Are A Trigger For Quick Response Alerts

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QRA launches are ordered for a range of reasons. However, the most common reasons are to intercept unidentified aircraft or investigate an airliner that has stopped responding to communications. The RAF has fighter jets available at 24-hour readiness and capable of launching within minutes to respond to any incident.

The two aircraft launched on Friday were Eurofighter Typhoon FGR4s flying under the callsigns RIGID 11 and RIGID 12, scrambled from RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire. These jets are capable of going supersonic if needed, although they apparently did not exercise this capability on Friday evening, as no sonic booms were reported. Tracking data showed both jets squawking a transponder code allocated to NATO Air Policing.

The majority of RAF intercepts involve business jets or general aviation traffic rather than scheduled commercial flights. In some cases, QRA’s can cause significant disturbances to the general population if the jets go supersonic, which can be deemed a necessity in emergencies. In a notable incident in October 2023, a Kenya Airways Boeing 787 Dreamliner was intercepted by RAF Typhoons and forced to divert from London Heathrow (LHR) to London Stansted (STN).