On a Ryanair flight from Greece to Germany, a passenger was partly thrown out of a broken window in mid-air. In an instant, his wife, seated beside him, grabbed hold of him, and her quick action saved his life. She said that as she held her husband’s legs tight, only one thought came to her mind — if they had to die, they would die together.
In an interview with the Serbian outlet Nova, Svetlana Grkovic said her husband, Ljubisa Karovic, was thrown out head-first when the acrylic part of the window broke after an engine failure, leaving half his body dangling outside the aircraft.
“I immediately grabbed his two legs,” she said. “For about two minutes, his body was outside the plane up to his chest.” With the help of two other passengers, she managed to drag her unconscious husband back inside.
The incident happened last Friday on a Ryanair flight operated by Malta Air from Thessaloniki in Greece to Memmingen in Germany. About 10 minutes after take-off, the plane suddenly dropped about 9,000 feet. As the cabin pressure fell, oxygen masks dropped automatically and, in panic, many passengers left their seats and moved to other parts of the aircraft.
Fellow passengers said Karovic, 61, was not thrown fully out because he was wearing his seatbelt, though he lost consciousness several times.
Svetlana said her husband was still being treated at a hospital in Greece, with a seriously injured hand and burn marks on his body, and that he still could not remember anything of the incident.
She added that a woman and a man among the passengers had helped her, and that one passenger of Albanian origin in particular had played an important role, whom she wished to thank in person.
After the incident, Ryanair said the plane had returned safely to Thessaloniki airport when part of a window beside a passenger came loose shortly after take-off. An alternative aircraft was later arranged, and the passengers completed their journey to Germany the same day. Greece’s Hellenic Air and Rail Safety Investigation Authority is looking into the cause.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report