FlyDubai Passenger: 'We Felt That This Was It'

Panic gave way to action aboard a FlyDubai jet Wednesday after a violent struggle erupted in the cockpit, according to a passenger who says many on board feared they were about to die. Speaking to Israel's Channel 24, 23-year-old Miriam Ohayon recounted feeling the plane "completely lose control" on its way from Dubai to Tel Aviv before making an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia. "We felt that this was it—we were about to crash," Ohayon said, per the New York Times.

Ohayon said a fellow passenger spotted a fight in the cockpit and raised the alarm. Screams followed, and when the door was opened, she said there was "a lot of blood." Passengers then reportedly overpowered the assailant "with their bare hands," and a doctor and nurse on board treated the wounded pilot. Families, including Ohayon's sister, Tehila Ohayon, waited at Israel's Ben Gurion International Airport for word on Flight 1073. "She said, 'I can't return dead,'" Tehila Ohayon tells the Times of Israel of her sister.