German fighter jets help London-bound flight to Heathrow

Dramatic vision has surfaced of the moment two German fighter jets have been forced to go to the aid of a London bound plane after air traffic control weren’t able to make contact with its pilot.

The Jet Airways flight 9W 118 with 330 passengers on board was travelling from Mumbai to Heathrow when the radio contact ended abruptly in the airspace over Cologne.

The vision was reportedly taken from a British Airways plane travelling behind the aircraft showing the two fighter jets fly up alongside the plane high above the clouds.

The two Eurofighter Typhoons scrambled into position following the loss of contact to the passenger plane which was also carrying 15 crew on board.

The Evening Standard reports that officials said contact with the passenger plane was restored by the time the fighter jets were airborne and they were deployed as an escort to “ensure the safety of the flight and it’s guests”.

The incident reportedly occurred last Thursday. The incredible vision was uploaded to Facebook by CirrusPilot and has since gone viral being viewed more than 1.2 million times.

“Incredible footage of the German Air Force intercepting a Jet Airways 777-300ER bound for London (from Mumbai) yesterday after it failed to respond on the appropriate ATC frequencies,” CirrusPilot wrote in the post.

“The trailing British Airways plane captured the footage near Cologne Germany. The JA pilots saw the Eurofighters and after speaking over emergency frequencies the plane carried onto London.”

Jet Airways said in a statement: “Contact between Jet Airways flight 9W 118, from Mumbai to London's Heathrow Airport and the local ATC, was briefly lost while flying over German airspace.

“Communication was safely restored within a few minutes.”