Flydubai co-pilot attacked captain with axe, UAE official says

The co-pilot who attempted to take control of a Flydubai plane travelling to Israel attacked the pilot with a crash axe, the United Arab Emirates prosecutor general has said.

The flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv carrying more than 170 people plunged 17,000ft (5,200m) two and a half hours into its journey, before passengers managed to overpower the attacker and successfully take control of the plane.

Capt Smit Machchhar said he was lying on the floor injured when he realised the plane was sinking and he had to act, explaining: “I told myself to go for one last push to open the door from inside”, which allowed the passengers in.

Two reserve pilots then landed the plane safely in Saudi Arabia.

A crash axe is usually kept ​in the cockpit in case of emergencies.

The weapon used has been a key question for investigators, given the stringent security on such a sensitive route. Early reports from passengers on board had suggested it might have been a knife.

The UAE attorney general told state media that investigations were ongoing to determine the full circumstances and motives of the incident.

The co-pilot who launched the attack was an Omani national, according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Multiple media outlets including Reuters, CNN and The New York Times have named him as Hamam al-Hammami. There has been no official confirmation of this.

While working at another airline, Oman Air, US media reported that Al-Hammami was removed from flight training because of concerns over his radical views, and was given another role at Oman’s national airline.

He completed a three-year distance-learning course at Buckinghamshire New University in the UK and graduated with a degree in aviation management in 2023, the university said. It added he did not take any pilot training at the school.

Speaking to Fox News, Netanyahu said that after the attacker was subdued on the flight, he called out to the crew “Kill me, kill me!”

The Israeli prime minister added: “So, it’s clear that he was suicidal… It looks very likely that he was going to down the plane.”

He also said the attacker “underwent Islamist radical indoctrination”.

The UAE’s attorney general, Hamad Saif Al Shamsi, said investigations into the incident revealed that the co-pilot attempted to carry out a “terrorist act”, according to the country’s state news agency.

He also said investigations were under way to establish the circumstances, motives and any links related to the incident.

Machchhar, who was stabbed in the attack, was taken to a nearby hospital before being airlifted to Abu Dhabi, where he is reported to be in a stable condition.

The pilot, who is from India, was in “good health and recovering well”, the Indian embassy in the UAE said on Thursday.

“I am confident that the recovery will be there and I will become fit and healthy again,” Machchhar said.

About two and half hours after the plane took off from Dubai International Airport it begun to plunge sharply.

The plane signalled a “general emergency” code, squawk 7700, before switching to squawk 7500, a code reporting “unlawful interference”, or hijacking.

In an interview with the BBC, one passenger described the moment he realised that something was wrong.

Almog Itali said: “Suddenly the aeroplane started to, like a rollercoaster, to drop down [with] a massive G-force. It was falling down for 20 or 30 seconds, rapidly, and then balanced, and then started once again to fall down.”

People then began to rush to the cockpit, he said.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog said on Thursday that the alarm was raised onboard by an Israeli woman, Tali Manes, who heard a commotion coming from the cockpit.

Her husband, Zvika, along with three other men – Yaniv Hayun, Dr Shota Musayev and Asaf Rajuan – entered the cockpit after Capt Machchhar managed to open the door despite his injuries.

Hayun said, in a video released by the prime minister’s office, that the attacker was “trying to destroy the instruments in order to disable the plane”.

Hayun then described putting the attacker in a chokehold and pulling him outside the cockpit before other passengers helped to pin him down.

He added that he “pulled the controls” of the plane. “The plane started to level out, a bit more, and then [another] pilot told me he was taking control from there,” he said.

In an interview with CNN on Wednesday evening, Netanyahu said the stabbed pilot, passengers and second crew had “managed to prevent a 9/11 disaster”.