Commercial flight makes emergency landing in Middle East after reported pilot fight

A commercial plane has been forced to make an emergency landing in the Middle East after briefly signalling a potential hijacking.

The FlyDubai aircraft was travelling from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates to Tel Aviv in Israel on Wednesday with 180 people on board when the distress call was made.

Flight FZ 1073 landed safely a short time later in the city of Tabuk, a civilian and military base in Saudi Arabia.

An official confirmed that Israel had scrambled warplanes, fearing a hijacking of a plane carrying dozens of its citizens.

Israeli media, citing security officials, said the incident stemmed from a fight between the plane’s two pilots.

The FlyDubai plane transmitted an emergency alert shortly after take off, according to publicly available flight tracking information.

About two and a half hours after departing from Dubai, it abruptly descended from 33,000 feet to 17,000 feet within a minute, before making an erratic circle close to the Jordanian border and eventually landing in Tabuk about an hour later, according to FlightRadar24.

A second regional official briefed on the incident said a fight broke out in the cockpit and apparently involved pilots.

Photos and videos posted on X purportedly show a man in the cabin with blood on his t-shirt, following claims of a stabbing on board. This was backed up by eyewitness accounts to Israeli media outlets.

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“We heard screams on the plane,” one passenger sent in a text to Channel 12.

“Then they opened the cockpit and we saw blood, and someone had stabbed the pilot with a pocket knife.”

It wasn’t immediately clear what had caused the fight, the official said.

“The crew have been questioned as part of the investigation,” the regional official added but did not say if anyone had been detained.

Passengers on the plane told Israel’s Channel 12 by phone that they heard shouts from other travellers in the forward cabin during the altercation, saying the plane dipped steeply before landing in Saudi Arabia.

They also said that all the passengers are staying on the plane and that there is a heavy presence of Saudi security forces surrounding them.

Later, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the situation was under control.

FlyDubai is the lower-cost sister carrier of Emirates Airlines.

The United Arab Emirates has become a popular vacation destination for Israeli tourists since the countries normalised ties in 2020.

FlyDubai confirmed that flight FZ1073 en route to Ben Gurion experienced an incident and landed safely in Tabuk on Wednesday.

“Our teams are working closely with the relevant authorities,” the carrier said.

“Further updates will be issued as additional confirmed details become available.”

Flight-tracking data indicated that the plane was a Boeing 737 Max 8.

- with Associated Press