Choose the option that best completes the sentence. Because of congestion at Murtala Muhammed Airport, the aircraft was kept in a holding ___ for twenty minutes before it was allowed to land.

The fixed aviation term for the prescribed circuit an aircraft flies while waiting for landing clearance is a holding pattern. 'Circle' describes the shape but is not the collocation used in the register, and 'queue' and 'line' are ground-based terms that do not apply to aircraft in flight.