Yorkshire Houses Shaken By Sonic Booms

Two Typhoon jets were scrambled to intercept a civilian aircraft on Monday night, creating sonic booms which shook houses in Yorkshire.

The planes, based at RAF Coningsby, had been sent to identify the aircraft, which had not responded to air traffic control.

Residents of Yorkshire reported two loud bangs at 9.50pm, with one person on Twitter describing the scene: "(the) house shook and whole street was out, car and house alarms gone off".

The bangs were later confirmed to have been sonic booms.

An RAF spokesman said: "Quick reaction alert Typhoon aircraft were launched today from RAF Coningsby to identify an unresponsive civilian aircraft.

"Communications were re-established and the aircraft has been safely landed."

North Yorkshire Police tweeted: "Confirmation from RAF that loud bangs heard across the county were sonic booms from RAF Typhoon jets. No cause for concern."

Reports suggested that the plane that lost contact with air traffic control was an Air France flight from Paris Charles de Gaulle airport to Newcastle.

Air France tweeted that Flight AF1558 had experienced "a radio communication problem" and was "accompanied by two British fighters aircraft according to the procedure".

The plane landed safely at 10.20pm, the airline added.

Last month, two bangs heard around Northampton and Brackley were caused by Typhoon jets which had been scrambled from an RAF base in Lincolnshire to identify an unresponsive aircraft.