Firefly flight forced to turn back shortly after take off

KUALA LUMPUR - Firefly Airlines flight FY1002/MH9948 bound for Kota Baru from Penang at 6.55am this morning had to perform an air turn-back shortly after taking off due to technical problem.

The airline in their official statement said the aircraft's landing gear was unable to retract after being airborne and had force to turn back to Penang International Airport (PIA) 15 minutes later.

"The aircraft had landed safety at 7.30am and all 64 passengers and 4 crew members on board were safe.

"The flight's schedule was retimed and departed from PIA at 8.50am and arrived safety in Kota Baru at 9.50am today," the statement said.

The statement said that the airport (PIA) did not deploy their Airport Fire Rescue Services as the landing was just a normal landing.

This is the second of such incident after the Malaysia Airline flight MH192 which departed from KLIA on Monday had made an air turn-back after the pilot had detected problems with its frontal landing gear during take-off.