Dubai/Tel Aviv: Indian pilot Smit Machchhar, in a telephonic conversation with Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has said that he was first struck in the back of his head by co-pilot Hamam al-Hammami.
The co-pilot had apparently said that he wanted to pray and Machchhar didn’t find this strange as it happens in that circuit often.
“He went to the back of the cockpit. I didn’t look at him out of a mark of respect and kept my gaze forward …… After a while, there was a stunning blow to the back of my head. I nearly passed out. I remember opening the cockpit door ……. The plane was losing altitude …. Things got hazy thereafter,” Machchhar said when asked by Netanyahu to narrate the sequence of events.
Meanwhile, passengers of the Tel Aviv-bound flydubai flight FZ1073 have claimed that at least two crew members asked them to release the Omani co-pilot. This has added to the overall conspiracy theory, even as UAE authorities called it an attempted terrorist act.
They got suspicious when the crew members asked them to release al-Hammami and move back to their seats, the passengers said.
Videos from the plane showed passengers restraining the co-pilot and refusing to release him except to the police.
The 45-second video, shared by Israel-based news channel i24NEWS, shows al-Hammami sitting on his knees inside the aircraft with his hands tied behind his back. Passengers can be heard repeatedly saying “just police” and “only police” as they keep the co-pilot restrained.
It appears that the passengers were making it clear to the crew that the co-pilot would be handed over to the authorities rather than released.
An unidentified passenger can be heard saying: “One hour, 40 minutes. More five minutes,” at one point. The comment appears to refer to the length of time passengers had already kept the co-pilot restrained and their willingness to wait a few more minutes before handing him over to local police.
Two passengers involved in restraining al-Hammami told The New York Post that members of the flight crew had asked them to release him.
“They were asking us to untie the terrorist. We had no idea why,” banking executive Tzvika Manes told the newspaper.
Real estate professional Daniel Schlichter, another passenger involved in the intervention, said the request immediately made them suspicious.
“They were saying to free the terrorist. We got instantly suspicious of them,” he said.
The passengers said that an argument followed. They said they made it clear that al-Hammami would not be released.
“They said, ‘You are not God, you are not going to kill him,'” Manes recalled, adding that the passengers’ intention was to prevent further harm rather than kill the co-pilot.
The passengers also gave al-Hammami an oxygen mask because, they said, they wanted him to survive and face investigators.
“We wanted him to live so he could be investigated,” Schlichter said.
The drama unfolded after Captain Machchhar was attacked inside the cockpit. Despite being seriously injured, the Indian pilot managed to open the cockpit door, allowing people outside to realise what was happening and intervene. The aircraft had gone into a steep descent during the confrontation.
Passengers rushed towards the cockpit after hearing the commotion. They were joined by two flydubai pilots who were travelling as passengers and were scheduled to operate the aircraft’s return journey.
The two off-roster pilots took control of the aircraft and helped stabilise it before the plane was diverted to Tabuk, Saudi Arabia, where it landed safely.
