Pilot arrested after midair ‘stabbing and crash attempt’, heroes praised for thwarting disaster

London: A commercial aircraft flying from Dubai to Tel Aviv made an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia after issuing an alert that sparked fears of a disaster when one of the two pilots stabbed the other in an apparent attempt to crash the plane.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the evidence suggested that crew members and passengers prevented a disaster by entering the cockpit and stopping the attacker, in an “extremely serious” security incident.

The midair crisis began when flydubai flight FZ1073, carrying 174 people including prominent Sydney businesspeople Steven and Carol Moss, suddenly lost altitude and issued an emergency alert more than two hours into its journey, leading the Israeli government to scramble fighter jets in response.

Steven is the son of the late Sam Moss, a Czechoslovakian-born Holocaust survivor who went on to co-found the Katies fashion empire. Carol is the descendant of a famous Rabbi. The couple are major financial supporters of Jewish schools, aged care homes and charities and live in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.

Contacted for comment, Steven Moss said he was struggling after the ordeal and did not wish to speak to the media.

Netanyahu made his televised remarks on Wednesday afternoon in Israel (shortly after 11.30pm AEST) in the first official statement on the attacks by the Israeli government after hours of speculation about whether the incident was a hijacking, an altercation between pilots or a brutal attempt to kill all on board.

“I salute the heroes who demonstrated resourcefulness and extraordinary courage,” Netanyahu said.

“They saved many lives and averted a terrible disaster. The pilot who committed the stabbing has been arrested and is currently being interrogated by Saudi authorities.”

More details emerged after the passengers arrived safely in Tel Aviv on Wednesday night (about 1.45am Thursday AEST) on a second flydubai flight, which carried them from the emergency landing site in Saudi Arabia.

Netanyahu spoke to a passenger and officials who told him one of the pilots stabbed the other and apparently tried to crash the aircraft.

At least one passenger joined a crew member in breaking into the cockpit to stop the pilot attempting to damage the plane. Another crew member then joined them and managed to stabilise the aircraft, he said.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said the attempted attack “was thwarted solely thanks to the heroism of several Israeli passengers who stormed the cockpit, subdued the terrorist, and – with their own hands – restored control of the aircraft to an additional flight crew present on board”.

“According to our preliminary information, the terrorist had a single objective: to crash the plane,” Katz said in a statement.

Public flight radar sites showed that the Boeing 737 MAX was diverted to Saudi Arabia and landed about 90 minutes after a shocking plunge in altitude, with passengers describing “blood in the cockpit” after the fight on board.

Israeli media cited unnamed officials who said there was a “growing assessment” that the emergency had been intended as an act of terror. Other options were also being looked into, including the possibility of a mental health episode.

Passenger Almog Italie told Reuters it felt like the plane was passing through “massive turbulence” before he realised a life-or-death struggle had unfolded in the cockpit.

“It was dropping like for 20, 30 seconds, and then balanced, and then started dropping again, and balanced again, and then we saw that [there] are people in the front, directly [in front of] the cockpit,” he said.

Doron Spielman, a spokesperson for the Israeli prime minister’s office, said the wounded captain – identified as Captain Smit Machchhar – had drawn on “the last moments of his energy” as he lay bloodied on the floor to click open the release on the cockpit door.

“At that moment, some of the passengers that realised something was happening raced forward [and] entered the pilot’s cabin. They saw the injured pilot on the ground, and the other … the attacking pilot was standing over the control panel, bashing the control panel,” he said.

Netanyahu said on X that, “despite being stabbed and seriously injured, [Machchhar] fought back, resisted, opened the cockpit door, and enabled passengers and crew to overpower the attacker – preventing a catastrophic mid-air disaster … He saved the lives of 174 people, including Israeli citizens and other nationals.”

One passenger, in a text message to Israeli media network Channel 12 that was reported by The Times of Israel and other outlets, said: “We heard screams on the plane.”

“Then they opened the cockpit and we saw blood, and someone had stabbed the pilot with a pocketknife.”

In a video shared by one person on the flight, the captain is covered in blood as some passengers support him and praise him for saving the aircraft from disaster. A second member of the crew, possibly the other pilot, is seen tied up nearby and apparently unconscious.

The aircraft departed Dubai at 7.05am local time on Wednesday (1.05pm AEST) and initially flew over the southern part of the Persian Gulf before crossing over Saudi Arabia and heading towards Israel.

Fluctuations in its altitude began about two hours into the trip, according to Flightradar24. The plane then dropped 14,000 feet (4300 metres) in less than 30 seconds.

Authorities first became aware of the unfolding crisis when the aircraft issued a 7700 “squawk” code to signal an international emergency about 2½ hours into the flight, before changing this to a 7500 code to signal a hijacking or unlawful interference. Netanyahu called urgent meetings to monitor the emergency.

The emergency lasted for the next 90 minutes before it turned out of Jordanian airspace and landed at Tabuk, a city in the far west of Saudi Arabia.

A replacement plane carrying passengers from the earlier flight left Saudi Arabia and landed at Ben Gurion International Airport in Israel on Wednesday night to cheers and a crowd waving Israeli flags.

Israeli journalist Amichai Stein reported an account of the emergency from those on board and posted images of one passenger with a blood-stained shirt.

“We heard screams and saw blood,” one passenger said, according to Stein. “The pilot was stabbed. There were moments when we thought we weren’t going to make it out alive.”

The Israeli media said authorities were planning to question the crew and inspect the aircraft as part of an investigation.

A passenger called Yaniv met Netanyahu after the passengers made it to Tel Aviv, and he told the prime minister how he had forced his way into the cockpit to stop the attack.

In a discussion posted on social media, Yaniv described how he had “pulled the yoke up” on the aircraft’s controls to bring the plane out of its steep dive.

The pilot who suffered the knife attack was able to open the cockpit door even though he was wounded, allowing passengers and crew to come to his aid and prevent a disaster.

A passenger called Daniel told Israeli media outlet Channel 12, in remarks reported by The Times of Israel, that he had seen a struggle in the cockpit and an attempt to push someone out.

“Then three Israelis who were sitting behind me came to see what was happening, and the plane suddenly went into a very steep dive, nose down, with a very intense spin,” he said.

“The spinning stopped. It took some — I don’t know, it felt like an eternity, but I think it was two minutes, at least two or three minutes, during which the plane was simply diving and spinning like crazy.

“It felt like, that’s it. It’s over. September 11 is happening again.”

Israeli airspace was briefly closed during the emergency.

After the passengers made it to Tel Aviv on the second aircraft, Israeli authorities said one 51-year-old male passenger with a mild upper body wound was transported to a hospital.

Of the 174 passengers on Flight FZ1073, the media said 166 were Israelis.

Flydubai says flights to and from Israel will be suspended while an investigation continues into the pilot attack.

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