A PASSENGER on board an Aer Lingus flight forced to make an emergency landing in France has described the terror of passengers who feared the plane was going to crash.

Niall O'Reilly, who was on board flight EI525 from Paris to Dublin last month, has criticised the way staff dealt with the emergency, saying they were slow to explain what was happening.

The 39-year-old bank worker was travelling from Charles de Gaulle airport to Dublin on 11 February when a loud screeching noise could be heard from a wing, meaning the aircraft had to turn back towards Paris just minutes after take-off.

O'Reilly claims frightened passengers were crying in the aisles as cabin crew began shouting at them to adopt the brace position without any warning.

"One of the cabin crew looked very upset and that worried the passengers. At that stage there were one or two people crying. The cabin crew began shouting 'head down, stay down'. I don't know how many of them there were but they all started screaming it out. They didn't tell us this was the procedure which I thought would have been helpful because they all began bellowing it out."

After passengers heard the strange noise coming from the wing, O'Reilly was worried and summoned a member of cabin crew.

"I asked her to tell us what was going on. They told me that they were aware of a problem but that they were looking into it and they didn't know what it was. We carried on going up anyway."

Shortly afterwards there was an announcement over the intercom that the plane would have to return to Paris for an emergency landing. Passengers were informed that they would have to take emergency positions and to pay attention to the crew.

"He said:?'We may need to evacuate the plane on landing so listen out for this. If we need to we will shout it out and if we don't please remain seated'," said O'Reilly.

"Initially, everyone was just looking around. I was terrified. I had never heard this before or experienced anything like that before. The noise was going on for about five or 10 minutes and then there was another 10 minutes after that before anyone came down and said there was a problem. They could have told us; they were aware of it. I don't know what the procedure is, but could they have calmed people's nerves? I wasn't happy that I had to go and find out myself."

A statement from the airline said: "Aer Lingus can confirm that shortly after take-off, flight EI525 made a precautionary emergency landing. Crew dealt with all aspects of the operation in order of priority and the correct safety procedures were adhered to."