Arabia Maroc A320 Near Amsterdam on Dec. 5, 2015, Other Crew Saw Oil Trace from Aircraft in Flight

An Air Arabia Maroc Airbus A320-200, registration CN-NMI performing flight 3O-128 from Amsterdam (Netherlands) to Tangier (Maroc), was climbing out of Amsterdam's runway 24 on a southerly heading, when a KLM crew reported they had just seen an aircraft with quite an oil trace behind them, a few minutes later ATC queried what colour that aircraft had. The KLM crew reported the aircraft in question was on a southerly heading, they didn't recall the colour but a wild guess would be red. A few minutes later ATC inquired with flight 3O-128 whether their operations were normal and whether they would be able to reach their destination, the crew replied in the positive and was handed off to center cleared to climb to FL230. The crew advised however they wanted to stop their climb at FL150 and return to Amsterdam to investigate the observation. The aircraft returned to Amsterdam for a safe landing on runway 18C about 30 minutes after departure. After landing the crew reported all operations were still entirely normal and taxied to the gate.

The aircraft remained on the ground for about 2.5 hours, then departed again and reached Tangier as flight 3O-128A with a delay of 3 hours.

Air Arabia Maroc Aircraft feature a red vertical tail and red labels on a predominantly white/grey fuselage.