B737 Undifferentiated or Other Model
Dispatch Dispatcher
Time Pressure; Situational Awareness
Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy; Inflight Event / Encounter Fuel Issue
Flight Crew Returned To Departure Airport
Aircraft; Human Factors
Flight departed from ZZZ at XA:59; at approximately XB:05; I received a call from the Departure station personnel saying that the flight was requesting to talk to me on ZZZ operations frequency. I pulled up the station radio and while doing that I zoomed in on the ZZZ area on my map and the flight had leveled off at 10;000 feet and appeared to be circling the area. I made contact with the flight and the captain stated right after departure they had a Mode Control Panel failure. They had lost the autopilot and were flying visually on vectors only. I advised the captain to return to ZZZ and provided the time and my initials to show an air return.After I got off the radio; I sent a request to the aircraft to obtain fuel and weight information from FMC which indicated that fuel on board was 8;500 lbs. I thought that was low but did not investigate further due to my rush to calculate numbers. I received the report back and ran the numbers. I showed a burn from his present position back to ZZZ as 600 lbs with a landing weight of 122;800 lbs. A couple of minutes later; I realized I sent the request to the wrong aircraft which had been a different model of the 737 also flying from ZZZ. After realizing this error; I re-ran the numbers with the correct information and put a corrected amendment on the release. The fuel burn remained the same at 600 lbs; with 16;600 lbs fuel on board; and estimated landing weight of 118;600 lbs. The reason for this error is because I felt rushed to calculate proper numbers prior to the aircraft landing. Since it was so close to the airport; I felt like I didn't have much time and had to accomplish the task prior to the aircraft landing even though I had told the captain to show an air return at XB:10 with my initials. After landing; captain called me and said that the MCP failure had occurred at approximately 100 feet AGL; right after they had retracted the gear. He stated in his rush to prepare for landing; he and the FO forgot to declare an emergency with ATC. He also stated that ATC never asked about emergency declaration either.I need to slow down and not try to rush when accomplishing my work. I should verify the information I am using is correct. Even though in this case; an air return was appropriate; it might have been possible to continue to the planned destination. Next time; I could ask the captain how he felt about continuing.
B737 Dispatcher reported a flight had a MCP failure after takeoff and advised the Captain to return to the departure airport.