Flydubai Flight 1073 was a regularly scheduled international passenger flight operated by Flydubai from Dubai International Airport in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), to Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv, Israel. On 30 September 2026, while en route, the Boeing 737 MAX 8 experienced what Israeli and UAE officials have called an attempted terrorist attack.
According to passenger reports, the first officer, Hamam al-Hammami, attacked and seriously wounded the captain, Smit Machchhar, with the cockpit crash axe. Al-Hammami then sent the plane into a steep descent, in an apparent attempt to hijack and crash it. This caused structural damage to the aircraft's rudder due to overspeed. The captain was able to open the cockpit door to let in passengers, who restrained the first officer and stabilized the plane. Other Flydubai pilots deadheading on board then landed the plane in Tabuk. Al-Hammami was taken into custody after the landing. The incident is under investigation primarily by law enforcement agencies from Israel and the UAE. Images of former al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri and suicide bomber Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi were found on al-Hammami's social media. He reportedly planned to crash the plane into a Tel Aviv skyscraper, or into Ben Gurion Airport.
Background Aircraft The aircraft involved in the incident was a Boeing 737 MAX 8, registered as A6-FKF. The plane entered service with Flydubai on 21 December 2022. At the time of the incident, the aircraft was approximately three years and nine months old. Flydubai is owned by the Investment Corporation of Dubai.
Passengers and crew There were 174 passengers, including 150 Israeli citizens, and 6 crew members onboard.
The crew included two operating pilots: an Indian captain, Smit Machchhar, who was the pilot flying, and Hamam al-Hammami, an Omani first officer who was the pilot monitoring. Machchhar, age 38, trained as a pilot at Mainland Air in Dunedin, New Zealand, and flew for SpiceJet for 11 years before joining Flydubai in 2022. At the time of the incident he had logged about 9,750 hours on the Boeing 737 series, 6,400 of them as pilot-in-command.
The crew also included two deadheading pilots in the passenger cabin in order to operate the return flight back to Dubai: one British, and the other European from an unspecified country.
+ Nationality Number Description Crew Indian 1 Smit Machchhar — operating captain. Omani 1 Hamam al-Hammami — operating first officer. British 1 "James" — deadheading Flydubai pilot, scheduled to operate the return flight to Dubai. Unspecified (European) 1 Second deadheading Flydubai pilot, scheduled to operate the return flight to Dubai. Kenyan 2 David Kimotho (purser) and John Muchina — attended to the injured captain and helped maintain order in the cabin during the emergency. Unspecified 2 Cabin crew. Passengers Israeli 5 Tali Manes — heard the struggle in the cockpit and alerted her husband, Tzvika Manes, and one of the two deadheading pilots. Tzvika Manes — entered the cockpit and helped subdue the first officer. Asaf Rajuan — entered the cockpit and helped subdue the first officer. Yaniv Hayun — entered the cockpit, helped subdue the first officer, and used the flight controls to arrest the aircraft's dive. Shota Musayev — entered the cockpit and helped subdue the first officer, and treated the captain's injuries. 145 Other passengers. Other or unspecified 22 Includes passengers reported with Kenyan, Australian, Russian and Ukrainian nationality or citizenship. Total passengers 172 Total crew 8 Two operating pilots, four cabin crew and two deadheading pilots. Total occupants 180
Middle Eastern conflict Due to the ongoing conflict across the Middle East, several Western airlines reduced flights to Israel, but the airlines of the UAE continued to provide multiple flights each day between Dubai and Tel Aviv.
On 29 September, the day before Flydubai Flight 1073, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had received indications that Israel might be attacked ahead of the upcoming legislative election on 27 October. Political opponents dismissed the statement as "fearmongering". Opposition leader Yair Lapid was briefed shortly thereafter and denounced Netanyahu's warning and insisted there was no reason to panic. Lapid later stated, "Nothing even remotely resembling the [Flydubai Flight 1073] incident came up in the security briefing."
Incident
Flight 1073 departed from Dubai at 7:05 a.m. GST traveling west to Tel Aviv. The flight was scheduled to be three and one-half hours, and the incident started roughly an hour before its expected arrival. While flying near the Saudi Arabia–Jordan border at 9:21 a.m. GST, the aircraft plunged from an altitude of approximately to in less than a minute, diving towards the ground at speeds estimated at .Pereira, Ivan. "FlyDubai's recovery from extreme deep dive during attack 'extraordinary': Aviation expert" , ABC News, 1 October 2026. Accessed 2 October 2026. This airplane is going 600 miles an hour, pointed at the ground, and a passenger on board is able to pull back on the yoke, and pull the nose up out of the dive, and not rip anything more than the rudder off the airplane', ABC News contributor and retired Col. Steve Ganyard said.... Ganyard said at that speed, the plane is going faster than what it was designed for and parts of the plane begin to rip off. Images of Flight 1073 showed parts of the rudder ripped off." The plane briefly rose to , before descending again to and turning back into Saudi airspace. Shortly after the initial dive, the aircraft's transponder broadcast squawk code 7700, indicating a general emergency, and shortly thereafter broadcast code 7500, indicating "unlawful interference" or a hijacking.
Based on initial assessments by authorities and video and eyewitness accounts from passengers, al-Hammami, the first officer, stabbed and seriously wounded the captain, Smit Machchhar, using the crash axe kept in the cockpit, in an alleged attempt to gain control of the aircraft and crash it. In a televised interview with Netanyahu, Machchhar said "The co-pilot wanted to pray. A lot of the locals, they do pray, which is not out of the ordinary. While he was praying, out of respect, I was just 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." The sound of the struggle alerted Tali Manes, a mother waiting for her daughter to finish using the nearby lavatory. Tali informed her husband, Tzvika Manes, sitting in the front row, and one of the two deadheading pilots on board. Meanwhile, Machchhar managed to click the release to open the cockpit door from the inside, which otherwise would have been difficult to penetrate. Tzvika saw Machchhar fall out of the cockpit with the first officer "on top of him, stabbing him" as the plane began to dive.
One of the deadheading pilots (identified by the passengers as "James"), Tzvika, and other passengers, including Yaniv Hayun, Shota Musayev, and Asaf Rajuan then attempted to enter the cockpit, which Hayun said was difficult because the captain's body was resting against the door. They then overpowered al-Hammami, who was allegedly attempting to disable or damage the flight controls, and removed him from the cockpit. Hayun stated that he pulled back on the yoke to level the plane, based on the knowledge learned from watching the Canadian documentary series Mayday. The deadheading pilot "James" then took over, and was later joined by the other deadheading pilot. Al-Hammami was initially restrained with headphone wires, and reportedly yelled "Kill me, kill me"; he was later restrained with cable ties. Musayev, a dentist, treated the captain's injuries.
Upon receiving the hijacking code and being unable to contact the flight for 30 minutes, the Israeli Air Force scrambled fighter jets. Under certain conditions, and with the approval of the Israeli prime minister, Israeli Air Force protocol calls for a rogue flight approaching Israel to be shot out of the sky. The aircraft continued west into Jordanian airspace before turning around and heading back toward Saudi Arabia, at which point the fighter jets were recalled. After an hour flying at its new altitude of , the plane landed safely at Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz Airport in Tabuk, in northwestern Saudi Arabia at 10:45 a.m. GST (9:45 a.m. SAST). Photographs taken after the landing showed that most of the aircraft's rudder was missing; it had likely detached during the rapid descent when the plane exceeded its maximum design speed.
Upon landing, al-Hammami was arrested by Saudi authorities. Both injured pilots were taken to nearby hospitals. The captain was in serious condition after sustaining deep cuts to the head and hands; his condition was later reported to be stable. Musayev said that he feared that if the landing had been delayed by even a few more moments, the captain would not have survived. One passenger was also hospitalized, and some passengers required bandages for minor injuries, but most passengers were physically unharmed.
Investigation Al-Hammami is an Omani national who had worked for the airline since February 2026. He was 29 years old at the time of the incident, and was born to an Omani father and Syrian mother. According to Netanyahu, "he was suicidal, that's not a question" and interrogation revealed he had undergone Islamist radical indoctrination. According to Saudi television station Al Arabiya, he was radicalized while in Syria. Under its agreement with Israel, Flydubai was obligated to exclude Omani pilots from any of its Israeli operations because Oman and Israel do not have diplomatic relations.
In 2024, extremist material had been found in al-Hammami's possession while he worked for Oman Air. Oman Air suspended him from piloting because he had radical ideological views, assigned him an administrative role, and enrolled him in a deradicalization program, but Oman Air did not share its concerns more broadly.
On 1 October 2026, al-Hammami was transferred to the UAE, which launched an investigation into the incident, the motive, the weapon used, and any possible link to terrorism. Israel joined the investigation. ABC News reported that Al-Hammami was cooperating with UAE authorities, and indicated he had intended to crash the aircraft in Israel. Law enforcement agencies from Saudi Arabia and the United States are monitoring the investigation.
On 2 October, images of former al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri and triple agent suicide bomber Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi were discovered on al-Hammami's social media.
On 4 October, the Australian Federal Police confirmed an investigation by a counterterrorism team to determine whether al-Hammami became radicalized while on a student visa in Australia between 2015 and 2017. Also on 4 October, The Times of Israel reported that al-Hamammi had intended to crash the plane into a Tel Aviv skyscraper or Ben Gurion Airport.
On 5 October, The Wall Street Journal reported that Flydubai had performed a criminal-background check on al-Hammami when he was hired, but did not contact Oman to vet his experience, and that he had flown to Israel on multiple occasions. Al-Hammami reportedly told his interrogators that he acted in retaliation for the Gaza war and wished to die as a martyr.
Aftermath
In an official statement, Flydubai confirmed that an "incident" had occurred during the flight, noting that the plane landed safely in Tabuk and that all passengers were secure. A second statement cited "an altercation" on the flight deck, called the motives unknown, and said on-duty crew travelling on the flight landed the aircraft.