By Owen Evans
Contributing Writer
The captain of a Flydubai flight has described in detail how he blocked axe blows to the head from his copilot, who allegedly intended to crash the plane in Tel Aviv.
Capt. Smit Machchhar has been hailed as a hero for his role in averting disaster on the flight from Dubai to the Israeli capital on Sept. 30, helping prevent what the attorney general of the United Arab Emirates has said was an attempted suicide attack by the copilot who wanted to crash the plane into Ben Gurion Airport.
Machchhar, in an interview with Abu Dhabi-based newspaper The National, published on Monday, described the attack from his hospital bed in the Emirati capital, where he has been recovering with his head and left arm bandaged.
Machchar said that when the first blow landed, he thought something had gone “horribly wrong with the aircraft structure.”
Then he quickly realized he was being attacked and things had “taken a drastic turn.”
“The next thought was, ‘I need to get help in here,’” he said.
“My immediate action was to free myself from the seat belts, and I tried to just block the blows as much as I could,” he said, pointing to his arm where he was wounded as he defended himself.
“The blows were coming to the head. Immediately, my hand went to the knob, which opens the door, and I screamed for my colleagues, screaming his name.
“I believe that was the first time when I lost my consciousness.”
Flight FZ1073 was en route from Dubai to Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel, when the copilot allegedly attacked the captain with an emergency axe.
Emirati Attorney General Hamad Saif Al Shamsi said the 29-year-old suspect was inspired by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States and intended to crash the aircraft in a suicide attack, with the aim of “causing the greatest possible loss of life,” according to a statement carried by state news agency WAM on Oct. 9.
The aircraft dropped about 14,000 feet in 30 seconds before passengers and crew members intervened. Two reserve pilots who were on board later took control and landed the plane safely in Saudi Arabia.
The suspect is an Omani national.
Machchhar said he heard the cockpit door opening and heard screaming.
He said the scariest thing he felt was the aircraft nose “steeply going down.”
“I was not very sure that I’ll make it out alive from this. Did I give up? No,” he said.
The plane was carrying 174 passengers at the time of the incident. UAE officials have not publicly identified the copilot.
However, senior Israeli security officials said that he is Hammam al-Hammami, an Omani national.
Al Shamsi said the investigation found that the suspect’s radicalization began in 2017, when he was a student at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia.
During that period, he was exposed to extremist literature and began following online content supporting terrorist organizations and suicide attacks, the attorney general said.
Yaniv Hayun, a 50-year-old Israeli sewage pumping company owner, rushed into the cockpit, put the attacker in a choke hold, and pulled him out, according to his own account.
After helping others subdue the copilot, Hayun returned to the controls and pulled the plane out of its dive, he said.
Hayun was traveling with his wife and two daughters.
Another pilot aboard took over, and a second crew member landed the aircraft safely in Saudi Arabia.
When asked how he knew what to do to stabilize the diving plane, Hayun said: “I watch ‘Air Crash Investigation.’”
Aldgra Fredly, Tom Gantert, and Reuters contributed to this report.
