Wife Recounts Moment Husband Was Nearly Sucked Out of Ryanair Jet

What happened

On a Friday morning, a Ryanair flight departing from Thessaloniki, Greece, bound for Memmingen, Germany, experienced a terrifying mid-air emergency when a cabin window dislodged. The aircraft, operated by Malta Air, was approximately ten minutes into its journey when a sudden decompression occurred, causing the plane to drop nearly 9,000 feet in a matter of moments. During this chaotic descent, 61-year-old passenger Ljubisa Karović was nearly sucked head-first through the opening where the window had been. His wife, Svetlana Grković, acted instinctively to save his life by grabbing his legs and holding on as his head and shoulders were pulled outside the aircraft into the freezing, high-velocity air. With the assistance of two other passengers, Karović was eventually pulled back into the safety of the cabin before the flight made an emergency return to Thessaloniki.

What's new in this update

The latest details of the ordeal come from a harrowing account provided by Svetlana Grković to various media outlets, including BBC Serbia and ERT. She described the two-minute struggle to prevent her husband from being lost to the void, stating that his face was visibly deformed and bleeding from the extreme pressure changes. Grković recounted her internal monologue during the crisis, thinking that if they were to die, they would at least die together. She revealed that her husband remains in a state of severe shock and is currently unable to communicate or remember the specifics of the event. The physical toll on Karović includes serious hand injuries and burns, while Grković herself reports suffering from significant psychological distress, including a newfound fear of enclosed spaces and a lingering sense of suffocation.

Key details

Several key factors contributed to the survival of the passengers and the safe return of the aircraft. While Ryanair initially characterized the event as a window dislodging, a technical adviser hired by the Karović family has posited that the root cause may have been a failure in the aircraft's right engine. According to this assessment, debris from the engine might have struck the fuselage, shattering the window and triggering the decompression. Passengers on board corroborated this by reporting a sound similar to an explosion just before the cabin pressure dropped. Furthermore, the fact that Karović was wearing his seatbelt at the time of the window failure played a crucial role in preventing him from being immediately ejected, providing his wife and fellow passengers the necessary leverage to keep him inside.

Background and context

The aircraft involved, an 18-year-old Boeing 737-800, is part of the fleet operated by Malta Air, a subsidiary of the Irish budget carrier Ryanair. Aviation experts note that while modern aircraft are designed to withstand significant stress, older airframes require rigorous maintenance to prevent structural failures such as window blowouts. Sudden decompression events are extremely rare but pose a dual threat of physical ejection and hypoxia, the latter of which was reported by passengers who felt they could not breathe as oxygen levels plummeted. In its official response, Ryanair confirmed the flight returned safely and that medical assistance was provided on the ground, though the airline has been criticized by passengers for downplaying the violence and trauma of the actual mid-air experience.

What to watch next

The investigation into the incident is being led by Fraport Greece and is expected to involve a thorough forensic analysis of the aircraft's window assembly and right engine. A primary goal for investigators will be to confirm or refute the theory of an uncontained engine failure, as this would have broader implications for the maintenance schedules of similar aircraft within the Ryanair and Malta Air fleets. Legal experts anticipate that the Karović family may pursue significant claims for the physical and psychological damages sustained during the flight. In the near term, the aviation community will be looking for any safety bulletins or airworthiness directives that might be issued if a systemic flaw is identified in the window-seating mechanisms of this specific Boeing model used by budget airlines.