'Mayday — We Need Ambulances': Saudi Arabia and Jordan Reportedly Turned Away the Wounded Flydubai Jet

In 60 seconds: New reporting reveals that the wounded Flydubai jet's desperate "Mayday" call was met with closed runways: Saudi Arabia and Jordan reportedly denied the hijacked Boeing 737 landing clearance — twice — despite a trembling voice warning ambulances would be needed on the ground. Permission finally came for a landing at Tabuk.

Read our earlier coverage: 'He Hit Me So Many Times': New Cockpit Footage of the Flydubai Attack Emerges as Saudi Arabia Hands the Co-Pilot to the UAE

The Associated Press has pieced together what happened in the air after the horror in the cockpit — and it is almost as shocking as the attack itself. A person aboard FZ1073 radioed Saudi controllers with a trembling voice, declaring "Mayday" and reporting an attempted hijacking, warning that ambulances would be needed on landing. In the background, controllers could hear passengers screaming as reserve pilots fought to keep the Boeing 737 MAX 8 straight after its terrifying 18,000-foot plunge.

What happened

By the time the Mayday call went out, the worst was supposed to be over. Passengers had stormed the cockpit, overpowered the co-pilot accused of attacking Captain Smit Machchhar — stabbed in the head, arm and torso — and two off-duty pilots had taken the controls. What the crew needed was the nearest runway and a trauma team.

What they got was a refusal. Saudi air traffic control denied the initial request and redirected the aircraft toward Jordan. The pilots then asked to wait for landing clearance from Jordan's military — and were turned away minutes later. Still circling with no clearance, the pilots diverted back toward Saudi Arabia and pleaded again. Only then was permission granted for Tabuk Airport in the northwest. Controllers gave no reason for the denials.

Latest verified facts

• The account comes from a person familiar with the air traffic control communications who heard the transmission and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity, as reported by the New York Post (Oct 1), TimesNow (Oct 2) and the Free Press Journal — consistent across all three.
• The aircraft had first squawked 7700 (general emergency) before switching to 7500 — the transponder code for unlawful interference, i.e. a hijacking or attack.
• Captain Machchhar, an Indian national, survived and is recovering in a hospital in Abu Dhabi; the accused co-pilot — an Omani national — is in UAE custody after Saudi Arabia handed him over, with a formal UAE terror probe underway and Israel seeking extradition.
• In a separate major development, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office spokesman Doron Spielman told the AP that Israel will increase security precautions for incoming flights, including those operated by foreign airlines — pilots flying into Israel will be vetted and their identities known to authorities. Spielman confirmed there were no Israeli air marshals aboard FZ1073: it was civilians who intervened.

Why it matters

This is the part of the saga that changes the story from a heroic mid-air drama into a geopolitical scandal. The whole point of a Mayday call — aviation's most sacred distress signal — is that it overrides normal procedure. An aircraft declaring an emergency gets landing priority, full stop. Two sovereign nations reportedly looking at a stricken 737 carrying 180-plus souls, hearing a trembling voice describe a hijacking, and saying "not here" is extraordinary — and Saudi and Jordanian officials have offered no explanation. Aviation experts will be asking hard questions about why Tabuk was only offered on the second ask.

And then there's the security admission tucked into the same reporting: Israel — the country with arguably the world's tightest aviation security — now concedes that foreign airlines' crews fly into Ben Gurion with vetting left largely to the airline, and that no sky marshals were aboard a flight that nearly became the second 9/11. The fix Netanyahu's office promises — vetting every incoming pilot, knowing every identity — is a measure of how wide the hole was.

Impact on the USA and the world

The US has enormous skin in this game. The Boeing 737 MAX 8 is an American-built jet; the co-pilot worked for a carrier flying into one of America's closest allies; and the whole episode is now fused with the Iran question — Trump has linked Tehran to the attack, while Netanyahu probed an accomplice angle on Fox News. American travelers flying into the Middle East are watching whether the promised pilot-vetting regime actually materializes, and whether it slows or politicizes flights into Tel Aviv.

More broadly, the Mayday-denial revelation puts Riyadh and Amman in an uncomfortable spotlight at the exact moment both are under maximum scrutiny over the region's descent toward war — with a third US carrier group steaming toward the Gulf and Brent crude above $101. If it turns out a bleeding aircraft was played like a diplomatic hot potato, the reputational damage will outlast this week's headlines.

What happens next

The UAE's formal terror investigation is now the master clock — its ruling on whether the attack was "terrorist activity" with external planning will determine charges, the extradition fight with Israel, and the fallout for airline crew screening across the Gulf. Watch for three things: the flight-recorder findings, whether Saudi Arabia or Jordan explains the denials, and whether Israel's new vetting regime draws pushback from the foreign carriers whose crews it now wants to fingerprint.