“There were moments when we thought we wouldn’t get out of here alive,” said one of the passengers on the flydubai flight from Dubai to Ben Gurion, which was forced to land in Saudi Arabia after sending out distress signals. The flydubai flight testimonies now emerging describe minutes of fear, a steep descent and a drama inside the cockpit. Some of the most serious claims have not yet been officially confirmed.
Hours after the incident that put Israel’s security establishment on alert, accounts are starting to come out from people who were on board. The aircraft first transmitted a general emergency code, then a code associated with a suspected hijacking or unlawful interference. It changed course and landed in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia.
The event ended with no hijacking and all passengers reported safe. What they went through in the air is another matter.
flydubai flight testimonies: what passengers say happened
“It felt like a terror attack in the middle of the flight”
A passenger who was on the plane told i24 that people on board felt their lives were in real danger.
“It felt like a terror attack mid-flight. We felt we were going to crash. For whole minutes we thought: either we crash or we get murdered. We were just waiting to land in Israel,” she said.
In another account the same passenger said: “There were moments when we thought we wouldn’t get out of here alive.” According to her, there was an attempt to stab one of the pilots during the incident in the cockpit, and Israeli passengers stepped in and helped overpower the suspect.
Other passengers claimed they saw blood and that one of the pilots received assistance after landing. It is important to stress that the claims about a stabbing, the identity of those involved and the circumstances of the confrontation have not been officially confirmed by flydubai or by the investigating authorities.
A drop of about 15,000 feet in a short time
Flight-tracking data also gives a sense of how severe it was. According to journalist Amit Segal, the aircraft lost roughly 15,000 feet of altitude in about a minute.
Other reports claimed the sharp descent took place during a struggle between the two pilots, and that one of them prevented the other from continuing to descend. A further, graver claim, that one of the pilots tried to harm himself, was published in the name of reporter Hillel Biton. At the time of writing it has received neither official confirmation nor independent verification.
The abnormal descent, the change of course and the distress signals from the aircraft are what triggered the immediate hijacking fears and the scrambling of fighter jets.
“The whole IDF was on its feet”
Military correspondent Doron Kadosh summed up the scale of the incident in a few words: “The whole IDF was on its feet for the past hour because of a fistfight between pilots.”
Security consultations were held during the event with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Israel Katz and other senior officials. After the landing, the Prime Minister’s Office announced that the plane had not been hijacked and that the incident was not being treated as a security event.
A replacement aircraft will collect the passengers
According to reporter Dean Fisher, flydubai’s CEO informed Israeli transport officials that the airline would send a replacement aircraft from Dubai to Saudi Arabia, and that the passengers would continue from there to Israel.
An investigation into the circumstances is expected in parallel, covering the emergency codes, the abnormal loss of altitude and the reported confrontation in the cockpit. Until official findings are published, details that come from initial testimonies and reports from the scene should be treated with caution. For travellers whose own plans are disrupted, see our guide on what to do when a flight is cancelled.
