Capt Smit Machchhar, the Indian pilot who was attacked by his co-pilot during the latter's alleged attempt to crash a flydubai aircraft, described the incident in detail to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday.
Recalling the attack inside the cockpit, Machchhar said he felt a “big blow to the back of the head” and that “the blows kept coming”.
Notably, UAE investigators have said that the co-pilot planned the "terrorist act" and attacked Machchhar with an axe. Airlines are generally required to keep crash axes in cockpits, which can be used in emergencies to break a window for escape or open a panel to reach a fire.
Deep Dive
What led to the attack on Capt Smit Machchhar during the flydubai flight?
How did Capt Machchhar manage to open the cockpit door during the attack?
What actions did passengers take after Capt Machchhar opened the cockpit door?
Netanyahu spoke to Machchhar, who is currently receiving treatment at a hospital in the UAE. He also invited Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Indian pilot to light a flame on Israeli Independence Day.
What Indian pilot told Netanyahu during phone call
Asked how the attack began, Machchhar said the co-pilot had requested time to pray. Out of respect, he looked towards the front of the cockpit.
{{/usCountry}}Asked how the attack began, Machchhar said the co-pilot had requested time to pray. Out of respect, he looked towards the front of the cockpit.
{{/usCountry}}"A lot of locals, they do pray, which is not out of the ordinary. While he was praying, out of respect, I was just looking at the front and not at the back," he said.
Machchhar recalled that a few minutes later, he felt a “big blow” on the back of his head. "Suddenly, after I think I would say about four to five minutes, there was a big blow to the back of my head. My first thought was that there was catastrophic damage to the aircraft, and something was not right.
He said that as the “blows kept coming”, he realised that the aircraft was not the source of the problem and the co-pilot was responsible, "But then after that the blows kept coming one after the other. That's when I realised that it's not the aircraft, it's the other guy who was in the cockpit with me."
The pilot said he tried to fight back and stop the co-pilot. However, the initial blows had severely affected his vision, leaving everything “completely blurred out”.
“And at that point, the next thought, the next feeling that I had was that the aircraft was sharply going down. So my memory is still in bits and pieces right now. But this is what I remember out of that time,” he said.
Machchhar said he managed to open the cockpit door once, but believed the co-pilot had closed it again. “And at this point, I remember I was lying down on the cockpit floor. And I felt the aircraft and the whooshing sound and people screaming.”
"I had that one last fight left in me," Machchhar said, adding that he knew he faced certain death if not.
"That's when I pushed against everything. I gave everything that I had and just went for the door and opened the door and thankfully people were waiting."
UAE investigators say co-pilot was planning 'terrorist act'
UAE investigators have said that the co-pilot of the flydubai flight bound for Israel this week was planning a "terrorist act". He used the emergency axe kept in the cockpit to attack the captain, they said. However, investigators have not disclosed what may have motivated the attack.
"The co-pilot had attempted to carry out a terrorist act" and had "attacked the captain in the cockpit with the emergency axe and tried to take control of the aircraft", the country's state news agency WAM quoted UAE attorney general Hamad Saif Al Shamsi as saying, citing the initial findings of the investigation.
The co-pilot is currently in custody in the UAE. Several media outlets identified him overnight as Hamam al-Hammami and reported that he had been barred from flying in Oman over concerns about his extremist views.