New Delhi: Indian aviator Captain Smit Machchhar, who survived a violent attempt by his co-pilot to seize control of a Tel Aviv-bound flydubai flight, has provided a chilling first-hand account of the assault during a direct conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Recounting the sequence of events, Machchhar explained that the flight was progressing routinely until his co-pilot requested time to pray.


Sudden assault at 34000 feet

Machchhar stated that he had turned towards the front of the flight deck out of respect while the co-pilot prayed. “It was a normal flight, and the co-pilot (Hamam Alhamami) wanted to pray... which a lot of locals do... which is not out of the ordinary,” Machchhar told Netanyahu. “While he was praying, out of respect, I was looking at the front and not at the back, and suddenly, after about four-five minutes, there was a big blow to the back of my head.”

His immediate thought was that the airliner had suffered a structural disaster. “My first thought was that there was catastrophic damage to the aircraft, that something is not right... but after that the blows kept coming, one after the other and that's when I realised that it's not the aircraft, it's the other guy who is in the cockpit with me,” he recalled.

Though Machchhar tried to fight back, the initial impacts left him severely incapacitated. “I did try and stop him, but because of his initial blows, my vision was almost like nothing, and I was completely blurred out.”


The desperate fight for control

As the confrontation escalated, Machchhar felt the Boeing 737 plunge into a rapid descent. “And at that point, the next feeling I had was that the aircraft was sharply going down,” he said.

“My memory is still in bits and pieces right now, but this is what I remember out of that time. I did try and manage to open the door once, but I think he shut it back - closed. And at this point, I remember, I was lying down in the cockpit floor, and I felt the aircraft and the whooshing sound and people screaming.”

With the airliner falling rapidly, Machchhar summoned his remaining strength for a final effort to unlatch the flight deck door and alert those outside.

“And as I was telling the Ambassador here, I had that one last fight left in me,” he said. “Call it personal or call it for people, I did it because if I didn't do it, I was going to die, and that's when I pushed against everything... I gave everything that I had and went for the door and opened the door. And thankfully, people were waiting to pounce back... took over control and the rest is what you know.”

Prime Minister Narendra Modi also spoke with Machchhar via telephone, praising his “immense courage and unwavering resolve” in protecting the lives of passengers and crew despite sustaining severe injuries.