A plumber and a dentist are praised as heroes in FlyDubai near-disaster
[October 02, 2026]
By CARA ANNA
JERUSALEM (AP) — A dentist and other passengers wrestled with a violent
copilot. A plumber seized the controls as the plane plunged towards the
desert. And the captain, despite being stabbed, managed to open the
cockpit door — helping save all 182 people aboard the Israel-bound
flight.
“Hollywood isn’t creative enough to come up with stories like this!”
said Mike Huckabee, the U.S. ambassador to Israel.
Although major questions remained unanswered on Thursday about the
attacker and his motive, the story of ordinary passengers saving the
FlyDubai flight from disaster has quickly become the stuff of legend.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warmly embraced plumber Yaniv
Hayoun shortly after the passengers arrived in Tel Aviv late on
Wednesday. He later posted a five-star review of Hayoun’s professional
services, calling him “a hero who has saved many lives.”
“He can help you too — I highly recommend him!” Netanyahu added on X.
Hayoun was among several Israelis recommended for the Presidential Award
for Civilian Heroism, while Indian Capt. Smit Machchhar was called “a
HERO” by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
One met the prime minister wearing a bloody shirt
Many of the details emerged in a rush shortly after the passengers, most
of them Israeli, landed back home to cheers and waving flags.
Hayoun, apologizing for his bloody shirt, within minutes was telling the
prime minister and journalists what happened.
There had been little time for him and the others to think. Passengers
screamed after spotting the copilot stabbing the captain, and the flight
from Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, to the Israeli city of Tel Aviv
began a steep dive. Some believed they were about to die.
A handful of Israelis reacted, hurtling up the aisle after the badly
wounded captain managed to open the cockpit door. That was crucial, as
cockpit doors are typically locked to prevent hijackings.
They had to struggle, Hayoun said, with the captain’s body resting
against it.
The plumber seized the controls, just like in the movies
Hayoun said the copilot appeared to be trying to damage the plane’s
controls. He grabbed the copilot, and others began struggling with the
man.
Hayoun then tackled the controls. He had no training, but he remembered
what he had seen in movies.
“I asked him, how did you know how to do that? And he said, ‘Well, I, I
watched these air disaster films,’” Netanyahu told Fox News on Thursday.
It was not clear who among the passengers had security experience,
though military service is compulsory for most men and women in Israel.
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Israeli passenger Yaniv Hayoun, with blood stains on his shirt, who
was aboard a Flydubai aircraft that made an emergency landing in
Saudi Arabia, is welcomed at the arrivals gate at Ben Gurion
International Airport near Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, Sept. 30,
2026. (AP Photo/Tomer Appelbaum)
Soon, crew who had been traveling on the plane stepped in to
stabilize it, issuing a mayday call and seeking a place to land.
"He managed to stabilize the plane by the skin of his teeth,"
another Israeli praised for intervening, Asaf Rajuan, told
journalists. Aviation experts have marveled that the plane didn’t
crash after a descent so sharp that the rudder was torn away.
A dentist treated the wounded pilot
The handful of Israeli passengers grappled with the copilot for
several minutes before subduing him and binding his hands with the
cord from a set of headphones.
One of them, Dr. Shota Musayev, a dentist, also attended to the
captain, who appeared to have lost a lot of blood. “He was just
praying the whole time and was in contact with me, and I was afraid
we would really lose him,” Musayev said.
In video that Musayev shot and shared with The Associated Press, the
captain lay on the floor of the cabin, saying his head was in pain.
Musayev later told journalists he and the other responders knew
they'd had just seconds to act before a “critical event.”
But even with the copilot bound and subdued, they were scared that
other attackers might be on the plane. They sent other people around
the cabin to stand by.
“We didn’t know where we were going to land. Underneath us there was
only desert. We were afraid that they were taking us to a hostile
country,” Rajuan said. “We didn’t know who to trust. We didn’t know
if the pilot was with us or not … We started suspecting the flight
attendants, too.”
Finally, just about an hour after the plane issued a distress call,
it made an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia.
Now, investigators from across the region are working to understand
what led to the attack. The copilot still has not been publicly
identified.
As of Thursday evening, the world had not yet heard from the central
hero, the captain, who India’s Embassy in the United Arab Emirates
said was “in good health and recovering well.”
___
Associated Press reporter Areej Hazboun in Jerusalem contributed.
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