‘I couldn’t let all of them die’: Flydubai captain recounts opening cockpit door with ‘last push’ after copilot stabbed him

In a call with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Indian airline captain who helped thwart Wednesday’s terrorist attack on a flydubai flight to Tel Aviv recounted how he pushed the cockpit door open while fighting for his life after his copilot stabbed him and the plane began to plummet.

By opening the cockpit door, Captain Smit Machchhar enabled several Israeli passengers to burst in and overcome and immobilize the copilot. One of the Israelis, Yaniv Hayun, a plumber, managed to stabilize the plane, relying on pilot actions he had seen on the Air Disasters TV show. Subsequently, two other flydubai pilots on board took over the controls and landed the plane in Saudi Arabia.

“I was trying to save my own life,” Machchhar said during a call from his hospital bed in Abu Dhabi, in a 10-minute video posted by Modi to social media on Friday, as reported by the BBC. “But I also knew I couldn’t let all of them die,” he went on, according to a New York Times translation.

“I had suffered so many injuries that I had collapsed,” said Machchhar, with his head bandaged and tubes in his nose, before breaking down as he recalled the attack.

“I could feel that the aircraft was going down. I knew this was the last push, that the door was right there,” he said. “I was being hit even then, but I just opened the door and everyone came in.”

The Boeing 737 flight was carrying 174 passengers, almost all of them Israelis, when Machchhar’s Omani copilot stabbed him in an apparent attempt to crash the plane, which plunged nearly 14,000 feet (4,267 meters) in less than 30 seconds.

“I have been flying planes for 17 years and serving as a captain for the last 11 years. I can sense exactly what is happening with the aircraft even with my eyes closed. When I was down, I could feel that the aircraft was plummeting,” he said.

Indian PM Narendra Modi video calls Captain Smit Machchhar, praised his courage, composure; Says the country is praying for him after he risked his life to save others. The Indian pilot helped saved lives of over 150 people in the Fly Dubai flight from UAE to Israel

Full Video: pic.twitter.com/bg3PvogzUP

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Once Machchhar, covered in blood, managed to open the cockpit door, Israeli passengers who charged inside were able to overpower the copilot and tie him up and stabilize the plane, while other pilots who were on board brought the plane to an emergency landing in Tabuk in northwestern Saudi Arabia.

Machchhar, a married father of two, said that during those difficult moments, he recited the Hanuman Chalisa, a Hindu devotional hymn dedicated to Lord Hanuman, the monkey god, and traditionally recited as a prayer for strength and courage.

“Lord Hanuman gave me courage,” he told Modi.

Israeli passengers were flown home on a special repatriation flight from Saudi Arabia — which has no diplomatic ties with Israel — while Machchhar and the attacking copilot were returned to the United Arab Emirates, Machchhar for medical treatment and the attacker for interrogation.

Later Friday, a senior Emirati official said the attack was “a dangerous and potentially catastrophic act of terrorism” and hailed Machchhar’s “courage” in confronting it. The UAE had said on Thursday it was probing possible terrorism in the alleged attempt to hijack and crash the plane, but that other motives, including mental illness, had not been ruled out.

Modi told Machchhar that his “courage, patience and presence of mind” helped save hundreds of lives and avert “a great tragedy.”

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also credited Machchhar, as well as the passengers, with averting catastrophe.

Netanyahu claimed Thursday that the Omani copilot “underwent Islamist radical indoctrination,” but that it was “too early to say whether there was Iranian collusion” in the attack.