A man was almost sucked out the window of a Ryanair flight when it “detached” in mid-air en route to Germany, and other passengers pushed him inside, witnesses and officials said Friday.
The passenger, described as a tourist from Serbia on a flight from Thessaloniki in Greece to Memmingen in Germany, was hospitalized with friction burns but was otherwise in good condition, authorities said.
“Most of us had fallen asleep, we had closed our eyes. A noise was heard, like a tire bursting,” a fellow passenger told Radio Thessaloniki.
“We immediately realized there had been a decompression. There was screaming… for a moment I thought someone had accidentally opened the emergency door,” the woman said.
“The masks fell off and there was a strong smell. A passenger's head and shoulders were outside the window. Fortunately, he had not removed his seat belt.”
Other passengers near the man helped lift him up, he said.
Greek media reported that the incident had occurred over North Macedonia and said the window had been broken by a piece of debris that fell from one of the plane's engines.
Ryanair in a statement said the flight “returned to Thessaloniki shortly after take-off when a passenger window became loose during the flight. The plane landed normally and passengers returned to the terminal.”
The Irish airline said a replacement aircraft was made available to transport the remaining passengers to Memmingen.
