A plane that departed from Siem Reap for the Chinese city of Hefei had to return to its port of origin yesterday afternoon due to technical difficulties.

The flight was run by Sky Angkor Airlines, with ground operations manager Lee Moon Seop saying that all passengers were safe. “It’s not a big problem,” he said, calling the incident an operational procedure and not an emergency landing.

According to State Secretariat of Civil Aviation spokesman Sin Chanserey Vutha, the 178 passengers found themselves at the same airport they started from at about 4pm – only an hour after departing – as the Airbus vessel had to land due to unstable pressure within the fuselage. “This is a normal procedure,” he said. He also added that his department was made aware of the incident only hours after it took place.

“Generally, when there’s a case happening like this, the company would not report to us immediately. We only know [about it] based on the reporting system,” he said.

The Airbus 320-214 was leased from Kahala Aviation and is 17 years old. No major incidents involving Sky Angkor Airlines have recently been reported.