Flydubai flight FZ1073: how a stabbed captain, passengers and off-duty pilots stopped a cockpit attack

Flydubai flight FZ1073 left Dubai at 7.05 am UAE time on Wednesday, 30 September, bound for Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv with 174 passengers on board. Some two hours later, as the Boeing 737 MAX 8 neared Israel, its first officer turned on the captain.

What followed, pieced together from the airline, the governments involved and the people on board, lasted only minutes.

The attack in the cockpit

The co-pilot stabbed the captain, Smit Machchhar, an Indian national, at the controls. Flight-tracking data reported by international media showed the aircraft falling from about 34,000 feet to about 17,000 feet in less than a minute. The crew's transponder first broadcast the general emergency code 7700 and then 7500, the signal for unlawful interference, and Israel scrambled fighter jets.

Machchhar, wounded and on the floor, reached the cockpit door and opened it. "I was still getting hit, but I opened the door and others came," he later told Prime Minister Narendra Modi, according to the Associated Press.

The passengers

Passengers forced their way in and overpowered the first officer. Yaniv Hayoun, an Israeli passenger who later met Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said he and another man he took to be a pilot were first into the cockpit, followed by others. Netanyahu said that once restrained, the co-pilot shouted for someone to kill him. Israel plans to honour several of the passengers for their part.

The landing in Tabuk

Two off-duty pilots who were travelling on the flight took the controls and diverted to Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz Airport in Tabuk, in north-western Saudi Arabia. In a statement, flydubai said its crew on board had "successfully secured" the aircraft and "diverted and landed the aircraft", and that all passengers were safe and accounted for.

No passenger was seriously hurt, CBS News reported. Saudi authorities said two crew members were taken to hospital. Machchhar, who suffered stab wounds, was later moved to a hospital in the UAE.

The co-pilot

The first officer has not been named. An Omani official told CBS News that he was born in Oman and holds Omani citizenship, though the Omani government has not publicly confirmed his nationality. Israel Hayom reported that he had worked for flydubai for about nine months.

He was arrested when the aircraft landed and on Thursday was moved from Saudi Arabia to the UAE, where Israeli, Emirati and Saudi officials are questioning him.

What investigators are saying

His motive has not been established. Netanyahu said on Friday: "As time passes, the picture is becoming clearer; the attacker underwent Islamist radicalization. He came to crash the plane with its passengers. We are investigating whether he was dispatched, and whoever sent him will pay a very heavy price."

Israel's defence minister, Israel Katz, called it "an attempted jihadist terror attack". US President Donald Trump said the co-pilot might be linked to Iran "based on what I'm hearing", and warned of a strong response if that were confirmed; Netanyahu said it was too early to say whether Iran was involved.

The captain

In India, Machchhar has been hailed as the man who prevented a catastrophe. Modi spoke to him by video call on Friday, and Machchhar told him the others who entered the cockpit had "played an equal role". Read more about Captain Smit Machchhar.