With the Airbus site just a stone's throw across the border, the people of Chester are used to massive aeroplanes flying overhead.

But one unusual-looking aircraft circling above the city set tongues wagging this morning (January 6).

Eagle-eyed sky-gazers took to social media to ask what it was.

After a quick phone call to Hawarden Airport, The Chronicle can reveal it was a military plane on a training exercise.

A spokesman for Air Traffic Control said: "It was a military aircraft that was training in the area for a few minutes but it has now finished."

Mark Walker snapped this picture of the aircraft from Dee railway bridge
Mark Walker snapped this picture of the aircraft from Dee railway bridge

The spokesman was unable to confirm what model it was, though it was thought to be an RAF Airbus A400M.

The transport aircraft, which has distinctive curved propellers, has been spotted doing a ‘touch down and go’ landing on the runway at Hawarden airport in the past.

This Airbus A400M military RAF aircraft was spotted circling above the skies of Chester in 2015