Captain Smit Machcchar is not only well-trained but also “a good person” who puts others before himself, an ex-colleague said about the Indian pilot who fought off an attack by his co-pilot in the cockpit on a Dubai-Tel Aviv flight on September 30 and saved 174 lives.
“He is a very nice, humble, and very respectful guy. “Whatever situation we handle, we handle as a team. One person is flying the aircraft, and the other is navigating, communicating, doing the checklist, everything. So it’s a two-man cockpit. “His presence of mind, his heroic act, whatever you say, or God’s grace, that he did all this, is extremely commendable. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, the country with the most passengers on board, has hailed Smit Machchhar as a hero, and Indian PM Narendra Modi also spoke with him.
Because the danger is in the cockpit itself,” she said, but here the scene is totally different. Speaking to PM Modi from his hospital bed in Abu Dhabi via a 10-minute video call, Machchhar became emotional and recounted the plunge.
He respects everyone,” said pilot Teena Goswami, who was his colleague at SpiceJet, where he worked before joining flydubai four years ago. Using your training for the right thing at the right time is very commendable,” she further said. “I was lying on the floor injured, but I told myself to go for one last push to open the door from inside,” he said. He added that while he was fighting for his own life, his primary thought was that he “couldn’t let all those people die”. He said he recited the Hanuman Chalisa (a Hindu prayer) to find the courage to fight back.
