A private jet from Farnborough Airport was forced to circle for an hour over Farnham homes because of a technical problem.

Weydon Hill Road resident Simon Trantom was disturbed by a plane circling Farnham on the evening of August 1.

He told The Herald: “It took off from Farnborough Airport sometime around 9pm and circled for a considerable time at about 2,000 feet before it landed again.

“I could hear it in the house and because I had the Flightradar24 app on my phone I decided to track it.

“I thought it couldn’t be a simple case of waiting for a landing slot but it must be in trouble and was trying to burn off fuel – if it wasn’t in trouble it was very much a nuisance.”

He added: “It seems a very dangerous practice to circle in such a manner over and across such a heavily populated area as Farnham in these circumstances.

“There is also the factor of the amount of pollution this adds to our air quality.”

The plane was a Gulfstream G650, an American-made business jet designed for long-range flights of up to 8,100 miles at high speeds, burning 1,900 litres of fuel an hour.

A Farnborough Airport spokesperson said: “On Friday, August 1, a departing aircraft reported a technical issue identified during flight.

“For safety reasons, the aircraft requested to remain within our airspace, before re-routing to land safely at Farnborough Airport. There was never any risk to surrounding communities as result of this standardised procedure.”

The spokesperson did not respond to the question of whether the circling would have increased the levels of pollution in the area.

However, research by Sweden’s Linnaeus University estimates a private jet produces more carbon dioxide per hour than the average person does in a year.