Flydubai flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv signals emergency

London: A commercial aircraft flying from Dubai to Tel Aviv has made an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia after issuing an alert that initially sparked fears of a hijacking or other threat to 180 passengers and crew.

The flight, flydubai FZ1073, landed safely amid reports of a fight between the pilots and accounts in the Israeli media of “blood in the cockpit” from a stabbing.

Israeli government officials told the media that it was not a hijacking.

“We heard screams on the plane,” one passenger said in a text message to Israeli media network Channel 12 that was reported by The Times of Israel and other outlets.

“Then they opened the cockpit and we saw blood, and someone had stabbed the pilot with a pocketknife.”

Sources told CNN there had been a “violent incident” between two pilots.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called urgent meetings to monitor the emergency after the aircraft first issued a 7700 “squawk” code to signal an international emergency, before changing this to a 7500 code to signal a hijacking or unlawful interference, according to reports.

Israeli Air Force fighter jets were scrambled to head towards the aircraft before its landing.

The Israel Defence Forces chief of staff, Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir, held an assessment of the incident with senior officers, The Times of Israel reported.

“The incident was later understood not to have been a hijacking, according to Israeli officials and defence sources, with the emergency apparently stemming from the altercation between the pilots aboard the aircraft,” The Jerusalem Post reported.

Israeli journalist Amichai Stein reported an account of the emergency from those on board and posted images of one passenger with a blood-stained shirt.

“We heard screams and saw blood,” one passenger said, according to Stein. “The pilot was stabbed. There were moments when we thought we weren’t going to make it out alive.”

Stein is a contributor to The Jerusalem Post and the diplomatic correspondent for iNews24 in Tel Aviv.

Flight tracking sites such as FlightRadar24 showed the Boeing 737 MAX initially flew over the southern part of the Persian Gulf before crossing over Saudi Arabia and heading towards Jordan and Israel.

After crossing briefly into Jordanian airspace, it turned back to land at Tabuk, a city in the far west of Saudi Arabia.

The Israeli media said authorities were planning to question the crew and inspect the aircraft as part of an investigation into the scare.

The airline, which is owned by the investment arm of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, is expected to send another aircraft to the Saudi airport to transfer the passengers to Tel Aviv.

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