When something like this happens mid-air, you hear a lot of noise. But the name that keeps coming up as the real difference-maker is Captain Smit Machchhar. He’s the Indian pilot who got stabbed by his own co-pilot on a flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv, yet still managed to fight back hard enough that the plane didn’t go down with 174 people on board.
Machchhar is from Gujarat originally, grew up around Mumbai way. He’s not some flashy celebrity pilot. Just a solid, experienced guy who’s been flying Boeing 737s for years. He started with SpiceJet back in June 2011 and stuck with them for about 11 years. Climbed the ranks to senior commander, then became a Line Training Captain in late 2020 — meaning he was the one training and checking other pilots, making sure they knew what they were doing. By the time he left, he’d logged more than 9,500 hours, over 6,400 of those as the guy in command.
In June 2022 he moved to flydubai as a direct-entry captain. That’s the Emirati low-cost carrier. His LinkedIn and the people who know him say he’s got roughly 9,750 hours total on the 737 family — the regular 800s and the MAX 8 and 9. He’s got a business administration degree from Welingkar Institute of Management too. Nothing fancy on paper, just years of quiet competence.
On 30 September the flight was FZ1073, Dubai to Tel Aviv. Routine until it wasn’t. Somewhere over the region the co-pilot — reported as an Omani national — attacked Machchhar in the cockpit. Stabbed him. Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, say the attacker then tried to crash the plane. The aircraft dropped hard — flight data shows it losing something like 14,000 feet in under half a minute, maybe more depending on how you count it. Passengers felt the plane go into a dive. Emergency codes went out. Israel scrambled jets for a bit.
Here’s where Machchhar comes in. Even with serious wounds — bleeding from the head and hands, according to people who treated him on board — he kept fighting. Passenger accounts that reached Netanyahu say he somehow unlocked or opened the cockpit door before he collapsed. One passenger who spoke to the Israeli PM put it simply: the door was unlocked, and Machchhar was right there, so he must have managed it just before going down. That opening let a crew member and passengers force their way in. They overpowered the attacker. Two other qualified pilots who happened to be travelling as passengers helped stabilise the aircraft and get it down safely.
The plane diverted to Tabuk in northwestern Saudi Arabia and landed without further drama. Both pilots went to hospital. Machchhar was in stable condition, according to the Indian Embassy. An Israeli dentist on the flight and others gave him first aid in the air to keep him going until they reached the ground.
Netanyahu called him a true hero. Said he fought back despite being stabbed and seriously injured, opened the door, and saved 174 lives — Israelis and others. India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi also publicly praised him for showing courage under the worst pressure. People who flew with him at SpiceJet just call him a good person, solid pilot.
The investigation is still going on — Saudi Arabia, Israel, the UAE looking into exactly what triggered the attack and whether it was a deliberate attempt to bring the plane down. Flydubai itself has been careful not to speculate. Motive isn’t fully clear yet. What is clear is that if Machchhar hadn’t resisted and gotten that door open, the story could have ended very differently.
He’s not the only one who acted. The passengers and crew who piled in, the off-duty pilots who took the controls — all of them mattered. But the captain who was already bleeding and still found a way to give them a chance is the one people keep pointing to. In the middle of chaos at 30,000-something feet, with a knife involved and the plane dropping, he did what he could.
That’s who Smit Machchhar is. Experienced Indian pilot, former SpiceJet training captain, flydubai commander, and the guy who, even stabbed, helped stop a potential mid-air disaster.
Sources:
India Today, The Jerusalem Post, Newsweek, NDTV, Ynet News, The Financial Express, News18, Indian Express, Israel National News, and statements from Israeli and Indian officials reported across multiple outlets.
@Rohit Manral