"I grabbed the attacker, put him in a chokehold and pulled him out. I called the Israelis who were with us, jumped back in and pulled the controls."

"I started pulling them back."

"He [wounded captain] was very close to the door and that made it difficult for us to open it. My conclusion is that he managed to open it for us before he collapsed." 

"The plane began to level out, and then [one of the other pilots aboard the plane] told me he was taking control."

Yaniv Hayun, Passenger on FlyDubai Flight 1073 

 

"[It was like] we were having very big turbulence, but there was no turbulence."

"My wife was standing near the cockpit because my daughter was in the bathroom. Suddenly, she heard shouting coming from the cockpit."

"She shouted to a replacement pilot from Fiji who was sitting there: 'Get in quickly, see what's happening'."

"He called for help, and two others and I entered the cockpit and subdued the attacker."

"I'm covered in blood. It was insane."

Almog Italie, Passenger on FlyDubai Flight 1073 

 

"[The aircraft was] pretty much out of control. It was really on the way to crashing, and it was simply he resourcefulness of many people who took control of the co-pilot and neutralized him."

"There was also a doctor who gave first aid, and people who treated both of them. Other than the pilot, there were no injuries, but the bigger fear was really a crash, which is exactly what he [the attacker] was trying to do."

Miryam Shira Ohayon, Passenger on Fly Dubai Flight 1073

 

"Despite being stabbed and seriously injured [Machchhar] fought back, resisted, opened the cockpit door, and enabled passengers and crew to overpower the attacker -- preventing a catastrophic mid-air disaster."

"...He is a true hero."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu 

The United Arab Emirates prosecutor general has ordered an investigation into the ‌stabbing aboard FlyDubai Flight FZ1073 from Dubai to Tel Aviv, which was diverted and landed in Saudi Arabia after a struggle in the cockpit.  Still from video

 

According to Israeli dentist Musaev Shota, after hearing shouting he ran toward the cabin, helped to bind the attacker and then proceeded to treat the badly injured captain of the almost-doomed flight from the UAE to Israel. He and the others tied the hands and legs of the suspect as he continued to struggle against confinement, while insisting that they kill him, and thus give him the martyrdom he sought, despite the failure of his suicide mission. 

 

How could a man harbouring such a mission and carrying a fair-sized knife be aboard a plane with 174 passengers, plotting to bring it down and destroy all those lives, including his own? Israeli authorities immediately following the event, spoke of 'radicalization'. The attacker, a man with Omani citizenship, was known to Omani authorities, it is now revealed. His radicalization and toxic beliefs were known, and steps were taken to deny him the opportunity to fly Omani aircraft.

 

When he was hired by the United Arab Emirates' FlyDubai, Oman appears to have made no effort to warn of the man's untrustworthiness. And as he on that flight as the co-pilot, attacked the unsuspecting pilot, the plane dropped 17,000 feet in under two minutes. Some two hours and 20 minutes into its flight as it flew over the desert close to the Saudi-Jordanian order, the Omani co-pilot decided it was time to act on his plot to cause the untimely death of all those aboard Flight 1073. His plan was to kill the pilot and knock out the plane's controls.

 

The two onboard pilots who stepped in to take the controls managed to rescue the situation even as the aircraft "sent distress signals". They managed an emergency landing in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia. Videos of terrified passengers screaming and crying appeared on social media, with children calling for their mothers and weeping in fear at the panic of the adults aboard. A woman on the flight said she saw a man holding a knife had forced the pilot to the floor, with blood everywhere. Seventeen strikes with a knife, head wounds and an almost-severing of an arm would do that.

 

Flydubai pilot tells Indian prime minister Modi that he couldn’t ‘let anyone die’ – video

 

The pilot, Smit Machchhar, an experienced aviator from India, had heroically while close to expiring, thought of the lives in his care as the pilot of the plane, and willed himself to make the effort to alert those aboard, likely in the knowledge that other pilots were aboard, in the hope that among those in the aircraft some might be inspired through their own will to survive, to enter the cabin, disable his attacker and enable the plane's plummet to be controlled.

 

And fortune decreed on that day in the sky in that geographic area, disaster was averted. When the plane was safely landed, the Israeli passengers sang "The People of Israel Live", Am Yisrael Chai! 

 

A FlyDubai flight bound for Tel Aviv plummeted more than 17,000 feet through the air after the co-pilot allegedly stabbed the captain in the plane's cockpit. (Photo credits: The Canadian Press, Reuters, Adobe Stock and Getty Images)

 

"[Initial assessments] indicate a foiled error attack intended to crash the aircraft with all passengers on board."

"While a catastrophic tragedy was  averted, this severe incident must be understood and treated as if the attack succeeded."

"It serves as an urgent reminder of the ongoing threats faced by innocent civilians across the globe, who remain deliberate targets simply for being Israeli."

"This was not only an attempt on innocent lives, but a direct attempt by extremist forces to sabotage the vision of peace, stability, and regional normalization fostered by the historic Abraham Accords."

Israeli diplomatic Mission in Canada