A London-bound flight was forced to make an emergency landing after a ‘deranged’ passenger tried to open a door at 30,000 feet and attacked crew members who tried to stop him. He was tackled and restrained by another passenger who spoken to The Sun about the shocking incident.
Victor Troboloni was travelling on a Wizz Air flight from Israel to the UK on Monday when he was forced to tackle the unidentified passenger as he tried to open the emergency exit.
“He tried to open the fire exit,” Troboloni, 45, told The Sun. “He was sitting at the back and it’s easy to open a fire exit, just pull the handle and that’s it.”
The passenger punched a male flight attendant before he was taken down by Troboloni. “I got the guy down. He was very heavyweight... I headlocked him and the stewardesses tied his hands with plastic cable ties... I had to do it,” the 45-year-old Albanian said.
Troboloni said he held the raging passenger down for 10 minutes until he was out of breath and too tired to protest. Crew members and other passengers then restrained him with cable ties.
The incident forced the London-bound flight to make an emergency landing in Belgrade, Serbia. “I held him for 10 minutes, he got out of breath, he got tired, he was tied up for 45 minutes to 1 hour before we landed in Belgrade,” Troboloni told The Sun, describing the entire ordeal as “very scary.” Troboloni, who was travelling to the UK to see his mother, said he was worried he might never be able to see his mother again.
He also added that other passengers were visibly upset by the ordeal, and many thanked him for taking down the attacker.
Wizz Air confirmed the incident in a statement saying “The safety and security of passengers and crew are the company’s top priority. The company regrets the inconvenience caused by this unexpected incident.”
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