Incident Occurs Shortly After Takeoff

A Ryanair flight from Thessaloniki. Greece, to Memmingen, Germany, returned shortly after takeoff when a passenger window dislodged in flight. Tracking data shows the plane was in the air for about 10 minutes when it abruptly descended 9,000ft (2,700m), with passengers reporting they heard “some kind of explosion.”

Passenger Injured and Held in by Wife

A 61-year-old Serbian national was being treated for friction burns after the incident, according to Michalis Giannakos, a Greek hospital official. “His wife held onto his legs for around five minutes to stop him from being sucked out,” Giannakos said. The man was left hanging head-first out of the window as far as his shoulders before other passengers managed to pull him back inside.

Passengers Describe Terrifying Experience

Passengers reported hearing a loud noise followed by a sudden decompression. “There were screams… for a moment I thought someone had accidentally opened the emergency door,” said one passenger, named Christina. Another passenger, Sofia, described the incident as extremely traumatic. “We thought the plane was going down. The decompression was extreme. It felt like we couldn’t breathe,” she said. The man who was injured was bleeding and then lost consciousness several times, most likely because of the lack of oxygen and the shock.

Michalis Giannakos, president of the Panhellenic Federation of Public Hospital Employees, later said that the 61-year-old Serbian man was being treated in hospital with friction burns. “He is in shock, remains conscious,” he added.

The aircraft, believed to have been an 18-year-old plane, was operated by Ryanair’s subsidiary Malta Air. Thessaloniki airport’s operator, Fraport Greece, said the incident is currently under investigation by the Hellenic Air and Rail Safety Investigation Authority. Fraport Greece added that it “is fully co-operating with all relevant groups and has activated the established emergency response procedures following the aircraft’s forced return.”

The Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) earlier told the BBC it was aware of the incident and would provide any assistance to investigators. Chris Brady, a retired airline pilot, told the BBC the incident “could have been worse” had the seat belt been not fastened. “We do, as captains always say to the passengers, please keep your seat belts fastened as a precaution in flight, even when we switch the belt signs off,” he said.

In 2018, a passenger died when debris from a damaged engine caused a window to break on a Southwest Airlines flight in the US, and she was partially sucked out. Additional reporting was done by Mark Allison and Nikos Papanikolaou.