An Oman Air flight from Kozhikode to Muscat was forced to turn back to the international airport here on Tuesday minutes after take-off due to a technical snag, airport authorities said.

The flight -- WY 298 -- with 169 people onboard which took off from the Karipur airport at 9.15 AM turned back barely a few minutes into its journey due to a technical fault and landed safely, a Calicut airport official said.

"It was a normal landing.. the aircraft landed safely," he told PTI.

The aircraft circled the airport for over two hours to burn fuel and become lighter before landing, he said.

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