On a related note, I was watching the landing planes come in (at night) while we were waiting to take off and could see 3-4 planes in line (literally) for landing. I wonder how much of a challenge it is for control to redirect those landing planes (but especially the next one).
Obviously there are regulations/procedures they follow in case of such an emergency, but I can't imagine it happens all that often. Not to mention how long did it take our pilots to realize there was a problem after landing. Anyone have any insight into the landing procedure/timeframe for something like this?