The woman who says she clung to her husband's legs as he was pulled toward a shattered airplane window now describes two desperate minutes of fighting to keep him inside. Speaking to Greek and Serbian media, Svetlana Grkovic says 61-year-old Ljubisa Karovic was hanging out of the Ryanair jet "up to his chest" after a window next to him blew out shortly after takeoff from Thessaloniki, Greece, en route to Memmingen, Germany, per the BBC. She and two other passengers managed to drag him back into the plane, operated by subsidiary Malta Air, while he repeatedly lost consciousness, she notes.
"I immediately reacted," she says. "I thought: 'If we die, we die together.'" Grkovic says other frightened passengers seated nearby bolted to other parts of the plane for their own safety, per the Guardian. Grkovic believes debris from a plane engine broke the window, causing the rapid loss of cabin pressure, per the BBC; a technical adviser commissioned by the family offered a similar theory, though investigators haven't confirmed it. Ryanair said the Boeing 737-800 "landed normally" after the window "dislodged."
A former airline pilot tells the AP that the incident should serve as a reminder to passengers of the importance of keeping their seatbelts on while in their seats; Karovic was reportedly strapped in when his ordeal began: "The seatbelt can help in those first few seconds. It's a difference maker." Karovic remains hospitalized with serious hand injuries and burns and doesn't remember the event, his wife says, per the BBC. Authorities in Greece, the US, and the EU are investigating.
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