John Pennington💙

The pilot that landed the plane Captain Steven is from Fiji. In the picture, he is in the middle. The crew of flydubai Flight 1073 were honored for their “courage and professionalism in ensuring the safety of passengers and securing the aircraft.” At the heart of that story are 3 pilots. The first is the captain, Smit Machchhar. On September 30, his Boeing 737 was flying from Dubai to Tel Aviv when his own co-pilot turned on him, left him badly injured and pushed the jet into a dive. It plunged 17,000 feet in less than a minute. “I was in and out of consciousness frequently,” Machchhar said later. But he told himself: “Do something.” He managed to unlock the cockpit door from inside, and passengers rushed in and stopped the co-pilot. The other 2 were flydubai pilots traveling in the cabin that day. They were only on board to fly the aircraft back to Dubai. Later reporting identified them as South African and New Zealand citizens. They rushed into the cockpit and took over a crippled jet. The dive had torn away part of the rudder. Passenger Almog Itali said the 2 pilots “entered (the cockpit) and pulled the aircraft up, pulled the yoke, stabilised the plane and landed us in Saudi Arabia.” They flew it for more than an hour and landed safely in Tabuk. Everyone on board survived. According to Saudi Arabia’s Interior Ministry, 174 passengers and 8 crew members were on board. Machchhar was treated in Tabuk, then moved to Abu Dhabi. The 2 pilots who landed the plane have never been publicly named. Flydubai has described them only as crew members traveling on the plane. A passenger later called the people who saved that flight “angels upon earth.” Not to minimize the life-saving actions of these pilots, but is it really necessary to completely erase the heroic and quick-thinking actions of the Israeli civilians who rushed the cockpit, neutralized the perp and stabilized the plane? Everybody would have died if they hadn’t stood up like that. We can honor both the pilots and the civilians. The whole episode is worthy of a Hollywood feature The bravery of the untrained lsraeli civilians by fighting and subduing the terrorist and then stabilizing the plane is worthy of a new Nobel prize category......valour One of the passengers, an Israeli (Jewish) plumber who first stabilized the aircraft by pulling up on the yoke in the cockpit and thereby pulling the plane out of it's dive before the two deadhead pilots took over. There was more to this story than these 3 pilots. 1st on pilot who did everything in his power to stop a terror attack. Than a group of Israeli passengers who raced in, pulled the nose up and obtained the terrorist and one doctor who made sure the pilot kept awake until the 2 deadhead pilots landed. All of these heroes avoided a catastrophic event. Rowan Tooth, a South African pilot originally from Kimberley, who was later awarded the UAE's First Class Order of Zayed II for his bravery.” was one of the pilots.