An American Airlines flight from Manchester to New York City was forced to turn back to England today after declaring an emergency over the Irish Sea.

The flight to JFK was due to take seven hours after leaving at 10.23am, but turned around east of Dublin and landed back at Manchester about an hour later at 11.24am.

The airline said flight AA211 returned due to a ‘maintenance issue’ and that its team would ‘get everything squared away and be wheels up again as soon as possible’.

Emergency services were photographed as the Boeing 767 returned to Manchester Airport and the airline told passengers in a tweet that ‘safety is our top priority’.

The plane reached an altitude of 30,000ft and a ground speed of about 430 knots around a half-hour into the flight before it began turning around over the Irish Sea.

One passenger called Sara tweeted: ‘We were in the sky for 30 minutes and then there was a problem with the engine so we had to go back to Manchester.

‘I am not feeling good… So far it’s not going too well but hopefully once we’re back in the air it’ll be OK… I hate flying as it is without actual stuff going wrong.’

American Airlines, based in Fort Worth, Texas, was founded in 1930 and now offers an average of nearly 6,700 flights daily to 350 destinations across 50 countries.

Yesterday the airline defended an unexpected pay increase for its employees, saying the raise was needed to keep pace with competitors and serve customers better.

Officials said the increase will correct a gap between American’s pilots and flight attendants and those who work for rivals such as Delta and United.

It came as US airlines face questions over their customer service in the wake of public outrage over United Airline’s treatment of a passenger earlier this month.

United was castigated after David Dao was pulled from his seat and violently dragged off a full plane by airport security in Chicago to make room for airline crew.

American has faced questions of its own after a sobbing woman’s baby was almost hit with a pram when an employee got into a shouting match with a passenger.

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