A mother on Flydubai flight 1073 said she 'saw death coming' and 'couldn't breathe' as the plane plummeted 17,000ft, describing her terror and the moment she didn't know which daughter to hug first.
Lital Hirschl-Shahar, 39, was seated in the 10th row of the Boeing 737 Max when the flight was thrown into chaos en route to Tel Aviv, Israel. She told the Daily Mail she felt 'no blood in my face' and her daughters told her she looked 'grey in the face'.
'Who should I hold first?'
'As a mum, I didn't care about myself. I was just worried about the four souls that were with me there,' she said. 'What can I do? Who should I hold first? Whose hand to hold first? Who should I hug? How do I do that?'
'I tried to stay calm for my girls,' she added, 'but the screams were ones you can never forget.'
Passengers storm the cockpit
First officer Hamam al-Hammami is accused of striking Indian captain Smit Machchhar with an axe and attempting to crash the aircraft. While the plane was in a steep nose-dive, passengers got out from their seats and burst into the cockpit to wrestle the co-pilot.
Hirschl-Shahar's children screamed, 'Father, no! Come back,' as they saw four men run onto the flight deck, she recalled. Another mother, Tali Manes, was accompanying her daughter, six, to the toilet when they heard heavy blows coming from the flight deck.
Flight data and aftermath
Flight-tracking data from Flightradar24 showed the flight descended from 34,000ft to 16,600ft in two minutes. Aviation simulation experts told Reuters it would have felt like a 'vertical roller coaster', with anything unsecured flying all over the cabin.
Two off-duty pilots, who had been travelling in the cabin, helped land the aircraft in Tabuk in north-western Saudi Arabia. Hirschl-Shahar added that, despite frosty relations between the country and Israel, passengers were treated warmly on arrival.
Flydubai suspended all operations to Israel's Ben Gurion airport, the airline said last week. Al-Hammami had trained at his nation's flag carrier, Oman Air, but was moved to an administrative role due to concerns over his extreme views. He had also completed a distance-learning degree in aviation management at Buckinghamshire New University, the university told Metro.
