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A ‘hero’ pilot, plumber and dentist among those who saved flydubai flight to Israel

Smit Machchhar was lying on the floor of the flydubai flight deck, covered with blood, when he managed to click the release to open the cockpit door, allowing passengers and crew to gain entry, overpower his attacker and save 174 passengers on board. Moments earlier, Machchhar’s fellow pilot had stabbed him, in an apparent effort to crash the plane which was travelling from Dubai to Tel Aviv. Machchhar, an Indian citizen from Mumbai, is being treated in a hospital in Saudi Arabia’s north-western city of Tabuk, where the plane landed safely. Machchhar is just one of several people hailed as heroes, for managing to wrest control of the plane from the attacker who apparently attempted to crash the flight, according to Israeli officials, who also provided much of the detail on how events played out inside the plane. In a post on X early on Thursday, Indian prime minister Narendra Modi lauded Machchhar a “hero”. “In the face of the gravest danger and despite being seriously ‌injured, he showed immense courage and an unwavering resolve to protect the lives of others. His valour helped save hundreds of lives and avert a great tragedy,” Modi said. Earlier, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been equally impressed by Machchhar’s actions. “Despite being stabbed and seriously injured, he fought back, resisted, opened the cockpit door, and enabled passengers and crew to overpower the attacker.” The incident began with a struggle, when Machchhar’s fellow pilot – reportedly an Omani national – stabbed him and ⁠sent the jet plunging nearly 14,000ft (4,267 metres) in less than 30 seconds. Soon after several passengers were able to enter the cockpit to help subdue the attacker. “What made it difficult for us was [Machchhar] himself,” said Yaniv Hayoun, who was among those in the cockpit and whom Netanyahu described as a plumber. “He had been stabbed and was on the other side of the door.” Hayoun later told Netanyahu that as people wrestled with the attacker, “I jumped back, grabbed the controls, and started pulling back the handles”, the way he had seen on television shows. Then other crew members took over. Dr Shota Musaev, a dentist on board, was also among those who ran to the cockpit. He told CNN they found the attacker on the floor on top of the pilot, stabbing him. He then rushed to help Machchhar, “terrified” he was going to die. “He was covered in cuts – his head, his hands – they were practically sliced open, almost severed in two … he had lost a lot of blood and was in bad shape. “I think that if we had waited even a few more moments, we would have lost him; his blood pressure had plummeted, he suddenly lost consciousness, and there was blood everywhere,” he said. Musaev told CNN he also helped subdue the attacker, recalling that he tied him up using headphone cords and plastic zipties. Other crew members then stabilised the descent of the plane and began to land it safely in north-western Saudi Arabia. Among those who intervened was an off-duty British pilot, according to a passenger, Almog Itali, who said the plane was carrying a pair of relief pilots who were meant to fly the next flight. “The relief pilots are European, one of them British, who entered [the cockpit] and pulled the aircraft up, pulled the yoke, stabilised the plane and landed us in Saudi Arabia,” Itali said in a clip posted by the BBC. Other reports suggested the off-duty pilots were from South Africa or New Zealand. Indian media reported that Machchhar underwent surgery in Saudi Arabia, while Indian officials say he is in a stable condition. They say they have been in touch with his family – reportedly a wife and two children – who live in Dubai. Aviation experts have expressed surprise the plane did not crash after a descent so extreme that most of the rudder was ripped off the tail. One passenger described the moment of the nosedive as like “massive turbulence … for 20 or 30 seconds.” “That was a serious descent and strong aerodynamic forces on that rudder for that to happen. I’m just amazed the aircraft didn’t come apart,” said former United Airlines pilot and aviation safety expert Steve Arroyo. “What saved them is there was enough altitude left for them to recover,” said Guzzetti, another aviation expert, who said it may not have been possible for the plane to level out if it had fallen below 10,000 feet. The fact Machchhar was able to unlock the cockpit door, allowing other passengers to enter and take control of the aircraft, no doubt saved all the passengers on board. Philip Kean the chief executive of Mainland Air in New Zealand – where Machchhar trained for 18 months in 2008 and 2009 – said the pilot had shown leadership after being attacked in mid-air. Calling Machchhar an above average pilot, Kean told New Zealand publication Stuff that pilots trained for all eventualities, but that managing it successfully when it happens in reality was a “whole different story”.

Daredevil Jaan Roose prepares to walk slackline high above central Seoul

Estonian aerial athlete Jaan Roose will attempt to cross a 160-metre long highline suspended 120 metres above central Seoul on Thursday. Roose, a three-time slackline world champion, will step out on to a narrow polyester ribbon between the Koreana hotel and the Dong-A Media Center, near the capital city’s famous Gyeongbokgung palace and Gwanghwamun square. The 34-year-old has made a name for himself slacklining dramatic urban environments, such as his 185-metre high feat between Qatar’s Katara towers. In 2024, he became the first person to slackline the strait of Messina between mainland Italy and Sicily, completing the 3.6km traverse despite a fall near the end, caught by his safety harness. Last month, he covered 14.7km over 12 hours on a line above the Danube in Bratislava, Slovakia. Large crowds in Seoul are expected to watch Roose walk the slackline – twice, at 1pm and 4pm local time – if the weather allows. The walk will be postponed if average wind speeds reach 10m/s or gusts hit 15m/s. Today’s forecast is sunny with light breezes. Roose said a visit in 2022 to South Korea inspired his Gwanghwamun walk. On that trip, Roose encountered jultagi, Korea’s traditional tightrope walking, which Unesco added to its list of intangible cultural heritage in 2011. Unlike tightrope walking elsewhere, jultagi is as much comedy as acrobatics. The walker sings, jokes and dances on the rope, trading banter with a clown on the ground as musicians play.

Israeli forces overwhelmed by violent settlers in ‘terrorist attack’ on Palestinian family

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has said Israeli settler violence in the West Bank has made everyday life for Palestinians “untenable”, as a mob attack on Palestinians trying to return home prompted one of Benjamin Netanyahu’s main rivals to warn of a campaign of settler terror. More than 100 militant settlers overwhelmed Israeli security forces early on Tuesday to attack a Palestinian family as they attempted to reclaim their homes which had been seized by settlers in the West Bank village of Jalud. Three Israeli security officials were injured and houses were set on fire. The impotence of the Israeli military, the scale of the assault and the injuries inflicted on Israeli security officers by settlers prompted unusually harsh condemnation from Israeli politicians and commenters. Israel is facing unprecedented international pressure over surging violence in the occupied West Bank, where settler militants backed by cabinet ministers have accelerated a campaign of ethnic cleansing ahead of Israel’s elections next month. Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, condemned the attacks in Jalud as a “moral stain”. Gadi Eisenkot, a former military chief and Netanyahu’s leading challenger in the upcoming elections, called for action to halt a “campaign of terror and violence”. Deadlier attacks by Israeli settlers, including ones targeting Palestinian children, have drawn less attention inside Israel. “Palestinian rights or safety are not the concern, even for people who are in the opposition,” said Mairav Zonszein, a senior analyst on Israel-Palestine with International Crisis Group. “The settler violence is an issue [for them] because it’s making Israel look bad, and also the idea that the military is losing control.” The ICRC said attacks, settlement expansion and severe restrictions on movement were making everyday life untenable for Palestinian civilians, who Israel has a responsibility to protect under international law. . “The frequent and severe violence must be brought to an end,” said Julien Lerisson, the head of the ICRC’s delegation for Israel and Palestine. “What international humanitarian law says on the protection of private and public property, and on the population’s access to essential services, must be respected.” A bar on imports of settlement goods came into force in the Netherlands last week, the UK has announced plans for even broader controls on trade and financing of settlements, and a similar bill will be introduced in the US legislature on Thursday. On Tuesday, a Senate bill demanding a human rights report on Israel’s occupation of the West Bank was narrowly defeated after winning backing from all but one Democrat. “Tonight a disaster was averted, but the barrier has been broken,” the Israeli analyst Roy Sharon wrote on social media after the vote, warning that “anarchy in the West Bank” may cost Israel military aid from the US and its international legitimacy. A cartoon in Israel’s largest-circulation newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth, on Wednesday showed two soldiers watching an arson attack on a Palestinian home. “They’re going to ruin my trip to Amsterdam,” one says to the other. More than 60 Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank have been wiped off the map since October 2023 and 18 others have been partly displaced, according to the Israeli rights group B’Tselem. Nearly 5,000 people have been forced from their homes, almost half of them children. The Tubasi family, whose homes were burned in Jalud, had been forced out this summer after a weeks-long siege by settler militants. Last week they secured a high court ruling ordering the Israeli state to evict settlers and secure their return. Late on Monday the Israeli military told the family that about 15 military police officers would escort them home immediately, Israel’s Haaretz newspaper reported. That was a small number given that Israel is celebrating the Sukkot holiday. The number of violent extremists in illegal settlements usually rises during festivals, and the force was outnumbered by a violent crowd within minutes of arriving. “To carry out an operation such as this, and during the holiday of Sukkot when the [settler] outposts are packed, is madness,” a security source said. The military had not informed national police and the Shin Bet domestic intelligence service of their plans, so they had no security backup. Settlers attacked a house when the Tubasi family arrived, forcing them to the roof, before the military decided to evacuate them in armoured military vehicles. The crowd then set the homes on fire, blocked roads and threw stones at Israeli security forces, injuring three personnel. The two houses “were damaged beyond description”, said Wael Tubasi. “They damaged everything – the doors, the tiles were removed, the stairs were removed. They smashed the bathrooms, doors and windows. They left nothing, everything was broken,” he told Reuters. Earlier this year the former prime minister Ehud Olmert called for the international criminal court to intervene to stop settler violence because the state had failed. Netanyahu condemned the “violent riots” and called for prosecution of the attackers, but defended the illegal settler movement. “The handful of rioters are not representative of the law-abiding settler public in Judea and Samaria,” the prime minister said, using an Israeli term for the occupied West Bank. A landmark 2024 ruling from the UN’s international court of justice found that the occupation violated international law, a position the British government has endorsed. An Israeli military spokesperson said two suspects had been detained, and called for action to tackle settler militants who targeted Israeli security forces. “The violence directed at soldiers while they were carrying out their duties crosses a clear red line and is unacceptable,” the spokesperson said. “There is no place for such incidents in the state of Israel, and they must not be allowed to become the norm. Such phenomena must be addressed at their root.” On Wednesday, some in Israel questioned whether the army and the state had the capacity to do that. “We have to look reality squarely in the eye: this was a terrorist attack and a failure by the Israeli defence establishment in its entirety,” Avi Ashkenazi wrote in the Maariv newspaper. “It is clear at this point that the real sovereign in Judea and Samaria are the extreme rightwing terrorist activists.”

‘Whoever is hearing me, we need help’: how flight 1073 survived its 17,000ft plunge

As flight FZ 1073 soared west over the waters of the Gulf towards Israel, its passengers may have bemoaned a 20-minute delay at takeoff. For a low-cost airline route, flydubai’s daily service to Tel Aviv is usually convenient and reliable. The nonstop flight takes about three and a half hours and departs early enough from Dubai that it usually lands at Ben Gurion airport at about 9am local time. That was not the case for Wednesday’s catastrophic flight. The passenger jet never made it to its scheduled destination. Instead, it dropped thousands of feet in seconds before limping down to make an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia – perhaps miraculously, since photos suggested a large part of the tail of the aircraft was missing. Passengers evacuated, some covered in blood, with stories to share of a pilot-on-pilot stabbing, and footage posted online from inside the fuselage showed the aftermath of violence. In one video, two men lie on the floor with breathing masks on their faces as passengers stand over them in the cramped gangway. One wears a white shirt soaked red with blood, and the distinctive pilot stripes on his shoulders. He appears almost unresponsive. The other man blinks slowly, with blood smeared on the wall next to him. A person off camera appears to encourage the injured man to remain conscious: “No sleep,” he says. More footage, apparently from a seat further back, shows passengers screaming and weeping in distress as the Boeing 737 Max shakes. Israeli media reported that the plane was carrying about 150 Israeli passengers. Accounts from the airline, passenger testimony, flight trackers and Israeli officials describe a series of horrific events starting about two and a half hours after takeoff. The flight tracking website Flightradar24 recorded the aircraft abruptly descending from its cruising altitude of about 34,000ft to 17,000ft in less than two minutes. Investigators will look at whether such a sudden and ferocious movement was the reason for damage to the aircraft’s rudder. Minutes later, the plane sent out a series of emergency transponder signals in the form of “squawk codes”. These four-digit codes are normally used by pilots to broadcast their position but can be used in an emergency situation, even if pilots are in radio contact with air traffic control. Aircraft trackers at Flightradar24 said the flydubai plane transmitted emergency and hijack signals. The aircraft made an erratic circle close to the Jordanian border before turning around and heading south. In one video, a passenger with blood dripping from an open wound on his head pleads for assistance and says the jet is descending into Saudi Arabia. “Whoever is hearing me, we need help,” the man says in Hebrew. “We are in the Tabuk area of Saudi Arabia, which we don’t know. All the passengers are OK except for the pilot. We need help.” What was happening during these critical minutes is still being investigated, but early unconfirmed reports pointed to a cockpit fight, followed by passengers storming up the aisle, and then either one or more pilots who were travelling as passengers wresting control of the plane to avert a disaster. The Israeli newspaper Haaretz cited a passenger as saying that the plane lost control and began to dive. Dalia Shpigel was quoted as saying that “suddenly there were terrible screams throughout the plane” before “three to five guys burst into the cockpit” and subdued the alleged assailant and began treating an injured pilot. “We realised that the situation was stabilising and continued the flight. Gradually, information began to emerge about what had happened in the cockpit,” Shpigel told Haaretz. Her fellow passenger Miryam Shira Ohayon said the “co-pilot tried to murder the pilot and basically carry out a suicide attack on the plane”. Speaking to reporters via speakerphone held up by her mother, who was waiting at Ben Gurion airport, she said the plane “was really on the way to crashing, and it was simply the resourcefulness of many people who took control of the co-pilot and neutralised him”. “There was also a doctor who gave first aid, and people who treated both of them … but the bigger fear was really a crash, which is exactly what he was trying to do,” she said. The Emirati carrier, in a statement later on Wednesday, said the aircraft was “successfully secured by on-duty flydubai crew travelling on the flight”, who diverted and landed the aircraft safely at Tabuk airport. Airlines often move pilots around different airports as passengers, and it is possible it was these pilots who sent the emergency codes. One passenger, Almog Itali, was quoted by the BBC as saying that one of the pilots onboard who stabilised the plane was British. “There were two spare pilots who were supposed to operate the next flight,” he said. “The relief pilots are European, one of them British, who entered [the cockpit] and pulled the aircraft up, pulled the yoke, stabilised the plane and landed us in Saudi Arabia.” Stanislav Bukhman, the head of risk at Osprey Flight Solutions, an aviation security firm based in the UK, said investigators were likely to focus on a few key areas, including how pilots were vetted, and crew screening at the departure airport. On how the flight deck might have been accessed, he said cabin crew could request entry to the cockpit using an emergency access code. “This exists for situations where the pilots are incapacitated. There is a safeguard built in, though. If the pilots are conscious and operating normally, they can deny that request and keep the door locked. This is designed to protect the flight deck in a hijacking or hostage situation,” he said. “At this stage there isn’t enough information to say how the flight deck on FZ 1073 was accessed. The door may have been opened by the captain, who reportedly resisted the co-pilot’s attempt to take control, or by cabin crew using the emergency procedure.” The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, announced that one of the pilots had planned to crash and kill its mostly Israeli passengers, who stopped a “major disaster” with their actions. The alleged assailant was arrested after the plane landed, Netanyahu ‌said. “During the flight, as they approached the country, one of the pilots stabbed the other pilot and apparently tried to crash the plane with everyone onboard,” Netanyahu said in a video message, calling the passengers “heroes”. All the passengers were accounted for and safe. Flydubai, however, said an “altercation” occurred in the flight deck of flight FZ 1073, and it warned against drawing conclusions about the motive. “At this early stage, the underlying reasons and motives behind this event are unknown and remain subject to a formal investigation,” a flydubai spokesperson said in a statement. “We urge all parties to refrain from premature speculation while authorities gather the facts.” Agence France-Presse contributed to this report

Netanyahu says pilot arrested after stabbing fellow pilot and apparently trying to crash Israel-bound plane – as it happened

A commercial plane travelling from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates to Israel has been forced to make an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia, after an apparent brawl between its pilots prompted distress signals that briefly raised fears of an attempted hijacking. The flydubai flight was over Jordan when it diverted to Saudi Arabia, transmitting three emergency signals, one of which indicated a possible unlawful interference. The plane dipped dramatically during the reported fight, descending about 16,000ft in just two minutes. Israeli officials scrambled fighter jets, fearful of a possible hijacking attempt on a plane containing dozens of Israelis, and the plane landed at Tabuk airport in north-western Saudi Arabia. A plane carrying passengers from an earlier diverted flydubai flight has landed at Tel Aviv airport on Wednesday, AFP TV images show. The second aircraft, also operated by flydubai, landed on the tarmac of Ben Gurion airport at 3.34pm GMT, after the passengers’ earlier flight was diverted to Saudi Arabia due to an altercation between the pilots. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said one of the flydubai pilots stabbed his fellow pilot and intended to crash the plane. He added that one of the passengers on the flight managed to break into the cockpit with one of the crew members, and together they “neutralised” the attacking pilot. Netanyahu described it as “an extremely severe security incident”. Other officials, including defence minister Israel Katz, have called it an attempted terrorist attack. Netanyahu thanked the passengers and crew who helped to stop the attack, saying they “showed exceptional resourcefulness and courage”. An Israeli official has identified the attacker as an Omani national, Reuters is reporting. The co-pilot of a flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv is believed to have stabbed the captain in a possible attempted “terror attack”. Saudi Arabia turned down a request ⁠by Israel to allow its planes to bring back ⁠Israeli passengers from a ⁠FlyDubai flight that made an emergency landing in the kingdom, ⁠two security sources told Reuters. The request was made to allow ⁠Israeli military planes to bring back Israelis from Saudi ‌Arabia, which ‌has no diplomatic relations with Israel, the ‌sources said. The Boeing 737 plane, which Israeli officials said had between 160 and 180 passengers on board, transmitted a general emergency signal about two and a half hours after departing from Dubai, according to flight-tracking website Flightradar24. Passenger Miryam Shira Ohayon said the plane was “pretty much out of control” when the alleged stabbing took place over Jordan on the flight’s path from Dubai to Tel Aviv. “The co-pilot tried to murder the pilot and basically carry out a suicide attack on the plane,” she told reporters by speakerphone held up by her mother who was waiting at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv. The plane again transmitted the initial general emergency signal before later landing at Saudi Arabia’s Tabuk airport. Tabuk airport said the plane landed at 9.45am local time and that both pilots were taken to hospital after sustaining injuries. A second flydubai flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv landed safely at its destination after the tracking data website Flightradar24 initially showed the plane diverting back towards the UAE. Flight FZ1081 was later shown to be on its way to Israel, where it landed in Tel Aviv this afternoon. US ⁠attorney-general Todd Blanche ⁠said ⁠that the ‌US ‌was ‌coordinating “very closely” with counterparts overseas, including ‌Israel, regarding the flydubai flight from ⁠Dubai to Tel Aviv that was diverted.

French court jails six men for manslaughter over mass drowning in Channel

A Paris court has jailed six ⁠men for manslaughter over the deaths of at least 27 people in the worst mass drowning on record from a small-boat crossing in the Channel. Seven other men were ⁠found guilty of lesser smuggling charges with varying degrees of seriousness, including facilitating illegal immigration as part of ⁠an organised gang and criminal conspiracy. Five years on, another four people are still missing. The court heard that the sinking of an inflatable dinghy in November 2021 was caused by “individuals driven by greed, with utter disregard for human life”. Prosecutors said the convicted men helped launch a “substandard small boat, uncertified, unfit for navigation on the open sea, overcrowded and lacking appropriate lifejackets”. Emmanuel Daoud, a lawyer for one victim’s family, called the proceedings a “trial of greed, cynicism and inhumanity”. Twenty-seven people were confirmed dead when their inflatable dinghy sank in the early hours of 24 November 2021. Four people remain unaccounted for. The victims were mostly Iraqi Kurds, but also included people who were Afghan, Ethiopian, Iranian, Somali, Vietnamese and Egyptian. The youngest known victim was a seven-year-old girl. The confirmed dead included 15 men, seven women and two teenagers. Sentences for the six men found guilty of manslaughter ranged ‌from six to 10 years in prison. For others, sentences ranged from six months suspended to four years in prison. The court heard that the men were linked to Afghan and Iraqi-Kurdish smuggling networks ⁠that organised the migrants’ passage to Britain from camps near Grande-Synthe and Calais in northern France. One man was found innocent. According to testimony from the two survivors, the flimsy boat, which had attempted to cross one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes between the northern French coast and Kent in southern England began to deflate and take on water after several hours at sea. Passengers fell overboard and drowned one after another, despite making about a dozen desperate calls for help to French and British rescue services. Only two men survived. For the people onboard the sinking boat, despite several distress calls, it was nearly 12 hours after the first pleas for help before the dinghy was finally found by a French fishing vessel. A separate investigation is continuing in France into seven French military personnel – five members at a maritime rescue coordination centre, and two sailors onboard a patrol vessel. They have been under investigation since 2023 for failing to help a person in danger. They deny the allegations. Zana Mahmand Mohammed travelled from Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan to address the court about his younger brother, Twana, 18, who drowned in the disaster but whose body has never been found. He said: “We’ve been waiting for our brother’s body for five years. I live with the uncertainty of ever finding out what happened. We lost a member of our family. He had a project for another future to live … ” The family had tried to dissuade Twana from leaving home, but he had wanted to find a job and develop his sporting success as a black belt in taekwondo and escape the violence and insecurity of his region. Mohammed said every time he read in the media about other small boats in difficulty, he relived the tragedy. “Destruction is being repeated,” he said.