Air traffic control blunder forced Ryanair jet to burn fuel in storm before landing with just 363 kg remaining

From the Newshound archive · first published 25 September 2026 · last updated 26 September 2026.

A Ryanair Boeing 737 carrying 171 passengers declared a mayday fuel emergency last October after air traffic controllers refused its first diversion request to Manchester due to an internal communication breakdown. The plane — on a Pisa-to-Glasgow Prestwick run during Storm Amy — failed three separate windshear landings at Prestwick and Edinburgh before finally touching down at Manchester with only 363 kg of fuel, against a mandatory final reserve of 1,100 kg. The Air Accidents Investigation Branch has now classified the episode a 'serious incident' and blamed the near-disaster partly on controllers who should have accepted the diversion far earlier. Pilots had no fuel left for a further go-around by the time they landed.

Manchester airport's own handling policies required the diversion request to be accepted — controllers refused it anyway.

Investigators found pilots did not consider diverting to nearer Newcastle, partly because of the stress of managing successive windshear emergencies.

The crew declared 'MAYDAY, MAYDAY, MAYDAY, MAYDAY FUEL' only after the third failed landing, knowing they could not survive another aborted approach.