Indian Pilot Stabbed on Israel-Bound Flight: 'Immense Courage'

Indian national Capt Smit Machchhar, 40, was stabbed by another pilot on board Flydubai flight FZ1073 en route to Ben Gurion Airport in Israel on Wednesday, forcing the plane to divert to Saudi Arabia. The captain, hailed as a "true hero" by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was taken to a hospital in Tabuk, a city in north-western Saudi Arabia, where he remains in a stable condition according to the Indian embassy in Riyadh.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hailed Capt Machchhar as a hero, citing the aircraft's role in averting a potentially disastrous collision. The Boeing plane, which carried at least 150 passengers.

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This includes nearly all Israelis, plummeted over 17,000 feet in under two minutes, according to data from Flightradar24. The dramatic descent occurred approximately two and a half hours into the flight. With the plane's rapid drop-off visible on the website's tracking data.

Capt Machchhar joined Mainland Air, an aviation college in New Zealand's Dunedin, in 2008, before joining Indian airline SpiceJet as a commercial pilot three years later. He moved to Dubai and joined Flydubai in 2022, having become an experienced pilot.

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"We trained him for forced landing - not this kind of situation, which is very, very rare," said Philip Kean, the CEO of Mainland Air. "It was a long time back but he came across as a good and honest worker."

The Indian government has praised Capt Machchhar for his "immense courage" and the pilot's identity has sparked widespread praise on social media. The Indian embassy in Saudi Arabia has confirmed that Capt Machchhar is in a stable condition and is receiving medical attention.