New Delhi, Oct 4 (IANS) Days after Captain Smit Machchhar was attacked by his co-pilot aboard the flydubai flight FZ1073 in an alleged attempt to crash the plane, Australia has launched an investigation into the incident following reports that the latter spent two years in the country as a student.
In a heroic act, Captain Machchhar, an Indian, saved 170 lives on board the Tel Aviv-bound flight despite being attacked by the cockpit crash axe and being badly injured.
The co-pilot, identified as 29-year-old Hamam al-Hammami from Oman, was granted an Australian student visa in 2014, before arriving in the country to commence a university course the following year, the UK’s The Guardian reported, citing a source familiar with the case.
His visa was cancelled in 2019 after he reportedly left the country in 2017. Authorities confirmed he was no longer enrolled in the course, the source said.
Al-Hammami studied engineering at an Australian university, as reported by several media outlets, citing his now-deleted LinkedIn profile.
However, it was not immediately known which university he attended.
The United Arab Emirates, which is leading the investigation, has called the in-flight brawl a “terrorist attack”.
Meanwhile, the crew of the flydubai flight reportedly clashed with Israeli passengers after they subdued the axe-wielding co-pilot who had attacked Captain Machchhar.
The passengers, however, refused to release the hijacker despite demands from the cabin crew, according to a media report.
Two Israeli passengers who helped restrain the co-pilot said the crew members repeatedly asked them to free the attacker, leaving the passengers suspicious of the crew’s intentions, reports the New York Post.
“They were asking us to untie the terrorist — we had no idea why,” banking executive Tzvika Manes, one of the three civilians who helped overpower the alleged would-be hijacker, said in an exclusive interview with the New York Post.
Real estate professional Daniel Schlichter, who was seated in the second row close to the cockpit, also recalled the tense confrontation with the crew.
“They were saying to free the terrorist — we got instantly suspicious of them,” Schlichter told The Post.
The disagreement escalated into an argument, with the Israeli passengers making it clear that they would not release the co-pilot under any circumstances.
A video shared by i24NEWS, an Israel-based news channel, showed al-Hammami kneeling inside the aircraft with his hands tied behind his back. His clothes appeared to have bloodstains on them.
In the 45-second video, passengers can repeatedly be heard saying “just police” and “only police”, indicating that they intended to hand the restrained co-pilot over to law enforcement authorities rather than harm him.
–IANS
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