Indian pilot Smit Machchhar recounts flydubai cockpit attack: “Smit, do something. You can’t die like this” | News Today

Indian pilot Smit Machchhar initially thought something had broken off the roof of his plane and hit him in the back of the head before realizing he had been attacked by his co-pilot on board a flydubai flight traveling from Dubai to Tel Aviv last month.

“I didn’t know what hit me at the time,” Machchhar told Sky News Arabia on Saturday, describing how a routine flight turned into a fight for survival.

He said the flight was normal, all formalities were completed and there was nothing unusual to indicate what was to come. It was the first time he had flown with a co-pilot, he said.

About two hours into the flight, he estimated, another captain, who was supposed to fly the return trip, entered the cockpit to greet them.

The co-pilot wanted to use the restroom around the same time and returned after a break. The captains continued to talk for several minutes before the co-pilot said he wanted to pray and asked the co-pilot to get out, Machchhar said in an interview.

Machchhar said the request didn’t seem unusual at first. Pilots could hand over the controls during the rest period, he explained, adding that prayer during this time was permitted.

When the attack began, he sat checking the landing timing and fuel on the computer. The co-pilot stood behind him and prayed.

Suddenly there was a “very hard hit” to the back of his head, the 38-year-old pilot said. “It was quite heavy and I felt it was something that was very powerful.

At first he thought something had broken off the roof of the plane and hit him, but within seconds he realized he had been attacked. He said the wounds narrowed his vision to several centimeters, which doctors later learned was a result of the attack.

His first reaction was to protect himself from further blows. He unbuckled his seat belt, tried to block the attack and suffered an injury to his hand. He then tried to call the second captain back to the cockpit.

Machchhar said he was shouting his colleague’s name and trying to operate the switch to open the door when he first lost consciousness.

He remembered that he managed to open it, but the door closed again after the attacker threatened to hit the others as well.

Soon after, he heard the engines slow down and felt the plane descend. Drawing on his experience as a pilot, he said he could detect a change in engine sound and aircraft movement without looking at the instruments.

“I was often unconscious afterwards,” he said.

His memories of the next few moments remain fragmented, the flight captain said, adding that he remembers trying to get to the cockpit door, getting his legs crossed and pushing forward.

His next memory was of the door being open and him lying between the cockpit and the galley.

The interview was conducted with Machchhar sitting on a hospital bed in the United Arab Emirates.

Wearing a hospital gown and with his head bandaged, he spoke about his recovery and the care he received after the attack.

At one point his eyes seemed to water as he remembered the support he had received.

Asked who he called first after the incident, a visibly emotional Machchhar said it was his two-year-old son.

Asked by an interviewer if he thought he might not survive, Machchhar said: “There was a moment when I realized and I said to myself, ‘Smit, do something. You can’t die like this’.”

Machchhar praised the colleague who took control of the plane during the emergency, calling his actions commendable and saying it was something he would remember for the rest of his life.

He said the determination of everyone on board to survive was what stuck with him the most from the incident.

“One thing I would take away from that day was the determination, the sheer determination of everyone to survive. The crew and the passengers. Everyone,” he said.

Machhar said he experienced flashes of the first blow, sometimes accompanied by palpitations, in the days after the incident.

“To be honest, I realized I was out of danger when I felt we touched,” he said.

Machchhar recalled that a doctor tended to him in the galley while his crew worked to keep him awake and conscious. At the time, he said, he focused on not giving up on life.

The incident occurred on September 30 aboard flydubai flight FZ1073, a Boeing 737 traveling from Dubai to Tel Aviv with more than 170 people on board.

The Omani co-pilot allegedly attacked Machchhar inside the cockpit with an emergency crash ax and attempted to take control of the aircraft.

According to the UAE Attorney General, the co-pilot planned to take control of the plane and crash it into the passenger terminal at Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv.

The investigation into the alleged attempted kidnapping is ongoing.

Machchhar managed to open the cockpit door, allowing the passengers and crew to intervene and restrain the attacker.

Other pilots on board the plane took over and diverted it to Tabuk in northwestern Saudi Arabia, where it landed safely.

The co-pilot was taken into custody while Machchhar was first treated at a hospital in Tabuk before being flown to Abu Dhabi for further medical treatment.

The Indian embassy in the UAE said on 6 October that he was making “steady progress” and “recovering his health”.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump praised Machchhar’s courage and called him a hero.

In the interview, the Indian pilot also expressed gratitude for the medical care he received in Saudi Arabia and the UAE, especially the support of the UAE government, and said he would never forget how he was treated.

In a separate interview with the UAE-based newspaper The National, also broadcast on Saturday, Machchhar also reflected on how he and others on board survived the incident, attributing their reaction to instinct.

“It was like a survival instinct that kicked in and luckily it happened to me and all my other passengers and colleagues,” he said.