'Everyone Trains, This Took Courage': Smit Machchhar's Ex-Colleague On His Heroics

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. He respects everyone," said pilot Teena Goswami, who was his colleague at SpiceJet, where he worked before joining flydubai four years ago.

Asked about how a pilot would react in such a situation, Goswami noted that Captain Machchhar had to open the cockpit door and press the emergency codes while he was being stabbed by the co-pilot, who is currently in custody in Saudi Arabia, where the plane landed after off-duty pilots onboard took over.

"We are trained for all situations. We have six-monthly sessions, simulator sessions. This presence of mind is part of our training, but using it at the correct time [is still difficult]," she told NDTV.

"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. But here the scene is totally different because the danger is in the cockpit itself," she said.

"His presence of mind, his heroic act, whatever you say, or God's grace, that he did all this, is extremely commendable. Using your training for the right thing at the right time is very commendable," she further said.

She added that it mattered that he's a helpful person in general: "When I spoke to people who flew with him, everybody had the same thing to say. That, instead of putting people down, he used to always make them learn... His approach is to help people."

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.

Speaking to PM Modi from his hospital bed in Abu Dhabi via a 10-minute video call, Machchhar became emotional and recounted the plunge. "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.

Having flown for over 15 years, he explained to the PM that his experience allowed him to sense exactly what was happening. "Even if I shut my eyes, I can tell what is happening inside a plane," he said.