Passenger prevents plane crash according to TV knowledge

Passenger Yaniv Hayun apparently learned what to do in an emergency from a television program about plane crashes. This is reported by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who met Hayun at Tel Aviv Airport. Hayun told him how he overpowered the pilot and then briefly took control in the cockpit. When the plane was descending, he is said to have intervened before another pilot took over the controls. How did he know what to do? According to Netanyahu, Hayun said the TV program “Mayday – Alarm in the Cockpit.”

On Wednesday there was a fight in the cockpit of a flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv. The plane threatened to crash, putting more than 170 people in danger. After the suspected attacker was overpowered, the plane was able to make an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia. Officials have not yet provided any information about the extent to which Hayun was able to stabilize the aircraft beforehand. Authorities in the United Arab Emirates launched an investigation.

Prime Minister Netanyahu recounted his conversation with Hayun in an interview with US broadcaster CBS. »I asked him, what do you do for a living? And he told me, well, you know, I fix clogged drains," Netanyahu said.

US President Donald Trump was also impressed. Netanyahu told him about it, he said at a press conference in the White House. "If you lift pipes all day, you're strong," said Trump. But he doesn't know whether the story is true.

The series “Mayday – Alarm in the Cockpit” has been broadcast internationally since 2003. According to the production company, the episodes will examine well-known air disasters, including through voice recordings, eyewitness reports and expert interviews. The accidents are also re-enacted with the help of actors and computer animations, similar to “File number XY ... unsolved”.

»I looked at my father. He was afraid. His face looked like that of a person who knows he is going to die": Eyal Datz was one of the more than 170 people on board the Flydubai plane. Here he talks about the drama in the air.