The incident was in the "cockpit".. The mystery of the damage to the tail of the "Fly Dubai" plane

Images circulated of the "Fly Dubai" aircraft that was heading to Tel Aviv before changing its course and making an emergency landing at Tabuk Airport show damage to part of its tail, raising questions about the reasons despite the incident that occurred inside the cockpit.

With the circulation of images of the damage, analyses suggested that the damage to this part of the aircraft may have resulted from a violent and sudden drop in altitude, accompanied by a significant increase in the aircraft's speed during the chaos that preceded its emergency landing.

The aircraft lost altitude suddenly, descending from nearly 34,000 feet at 5:21 GMT to less than 17,000 feet at 5:22, according to data from the "Flight Radar" flight tracking website.

Aviation safety expert Captain Youssef Al-Hamlan Al-Dajeh explained that "aircraft have maximum speed limits, and exceeding these limits exposes the aircraft's wings and body to severe stress." He suggested in statements to Al Arabiya/Al Hadath that the Fly Dubai aircraft may have exceeded this speed, leading to damage to the part known as the "rudder," not the entire tail of the aircraft.

The "rudder" is the movable surface mounted on the trailing edge of the vertical stabilizer (fin) at the tail of the aircraft, and its primary function is to control lateral movement, meaning the deviation of the aircraft's nose to the right or left.

In this regard, Al-Dajjah pointed out that the visible damage to the aircraft indicates that it exceeded the design speed limits, which led to the destruction of the "radar." He added that "if the tail of the aircraft had completely broken off, the aircraft would not have survived at all."

He linked this to the sharp descent of the aircraft, stating that "the aircraft descended from an altitude of 35,000 feet to 18,000 feet in about two minutes, even though the aircraft is designed not to exceed its maximum specified speed."

Al-Dajjah also noted that aircraft emit audible warnings when exceeding specified speeds, including sounds like "Speed" or an alarm bell, and that passengers could hear these warnings, indicating that the aircraft was in a very steep descent, possibly reaching an angle of descent of about 90 degrees, according to his estimate. However, he confirmed that damage to the "radar" does not necessarily mean a loss of the ability to land.

In conjunction with what happened in the cockpit, passengers said they were surprised by the rapid descent of the aircraft and its loss of thousands of feet in altitude in a short period. Passenger Miriam Shira Ohayon explained to AFP that the aircraft was "almost out of control" when the stabbing incident occurred.

Passenger Almog Itali also recounted that the passengers felt as if they were facing "very strong turbulence," despite the absence of turbulence, describing the sensation resulting from losing thousands of feet in altitude in seconds as akin to riding a "roller coaster."

While Israel considered the incident involving the "Fly Dubai" plane that was headed from Dubai to Tel Aviv as a "terrorist attempt," the airline emphasized that "it is too early to determine the reasons or motives behind the incident."

It is noted that Tabuk Airport received a distress call from a flight belonging to "Fly Dubai" at 8:44 AM, aiming to make an emergency landing, which necessitated the activation of emergency procedures and readiness to handle the situation and ensure the safety of passengers and crew members. It was later confirmed that a replacement plane carried the passengers to their final destination.