Man nearly sucked out of 'detached' window on Ryanair flight EUROPE
Ryanair said one of its planes was forced into an emergency landing
at Thessaloniki airport in Greece shortly after takeoff on Friday
after a window was "detached", with industry sources saying a
passenger was partially sucked out of it.
Happy travels
True, many aspects of flying “suck,” but keeping your belt buckled is one thing you can actually control.
Yep, last month on one our trips to SFO, the plane did an unexpected dip and wing tilt and the flight attendant was in some ones lap.
If it's Boeing, I ain't going.
The ...bus is for me. Ha! As if I have a choice.
Apparently, if you can believe Greek Media, a piece of debris came off the engine and struck the window which caused the blowout.
https://www.rte.ie/news/2026/0710/1582735-world-ryanair/
[snip]
Greek media reported the incident had occurred over North Macedonia and said the window had been broken by a piece of debris that detached from one of the plane's engines.
why can't you believe Greek media?
why can't you believe Greek media?
doesn't say you can't, but we don't have a lot of experience of their standards. Just to mix it up, the link is Irish media! But there is a question of witness accuracy, one says most had fallen asleep whilst Ryanair says it happened shortly after takeoff - how long was it sat waiting for takeoff????
"...why can't you believe Greek media?"
Why would I assume I could?
Why would I assume I couldn't?
edit: The source I got it from referred to it as "Greek media". I followed the link but didn't verify the nationality.
There is another article on this subject in Ekathimerini, a Greek online newspaper (in English):
It was due to an engine failure. The engine wasn't built by Boeing. It was built in France by GE.
The engine wasn't built by Boeing. It was built in France by GE.
GE is an American company headquartered in Ohio. The aircraft in question is a Boeing 737-800 equipped with CFM56-7B engines, which are manufactured jointly by GE Aerospace and Safran Aircraft Engines. Safran manufactures the low-pressure section (the fan at the front and the low-pressure turbine at the rear), while GE manufactures the other parts.
Quite true, JoLui. Back in the 90s I was a law firm associate, client was GE, it was a case about engines, and while most trips for the case were to Cincinnati, I did get to go to Paris, with commuter train to Melun, home of what was then known as SNECMA. They wined and dined me and my colleague, probably so we spent less time actually working. I remember feeling a bit nervous leaving Paris with a briefcase full of French engine blueprints, which I had a good explanation for possessing, but I didn’t want to have to give that explanation to the Gendarmes.
They wined and dined me and my colleague, probably so we spent less
time actually working.
Haha Slate, nothing out of the ordinary, a 'quick' business lunch in France is 2 hours if you're not in a rush, otherwise, you might want to clear your afternoon. :-)
Regardless of who makes the airplane or the engine - You wear a seatbelt when you’re seated on the plane because there’s turbulence and turbulence has gotten worse because of global warming
so unless you want to bounce off the overhead bin risking injury keep your seatbelt on even if just loosely.
I'm sure Michael O'Leary is trying to figure out how to charge more for a flight like this. Perhaps advertise it as a "fresh air" flight? or giving people the chance to fly in a "convertible?"
"so unless you want to bounce off the overhead bin risking injury keep your seatbelt on even if just loosely. "
And wear a diaper.
Carol's answer is spot on. Actually if people paid attention, most major airline flights tell you to keep your
seat belt on loosely. Clear air turbulence was a problem 50 years ago and will continue to get worse and more frequent as the climate changes.
Safran manufactures the low-pressure section (the fan at the front and
the low-pressure turbine at the rear)
It's not about the plane or the engine, it's about maintenance. That plane was 20 years old. Over it's lifetime it's had a lot of different engines.
I've seem pictures of the fan on that engine that shows a blade missing. Fan blades are supposed to be routinely examined (X-rayed, magnafluxed) to look for fatigue cracks, particularly at the root. I'm sure investigators will look at the maintenance records. When were the blades last thoroughly inspected.
Who did the maintenance, was it Ryanair or did they farm it out to another company?
I did mechanical engineering grad school work in fracture mechanics and fatigue crack growth. In 1970, I interviewed with GE AEG in Cincinnati. Even back then they were concerned about fatigue in jet engine blades.
A few years ago, there was a United 777 that took off from DIA for Japan and shortly thereafter threw a blade. It returned safely to DIA with the engine shredded and on fire (not fuel, that was cut off. Probably lubricating oil).
I agree with Carol. I'm a pretty "seasoned" flyer, and I always leave my seatbelt fastened during the flight.
And the same for a car seatbelt. After five years of road racing (SCCA), I always have my seatbelt on in the car. In fact, one day I backed the car out onto the driveway to wash it, and when I went to get out, I found my seat belt was fastened. It's just so automatic.
Those who dislike keeping their sear belt fastened during the flight, might like to check out SQ 321. Apart from dozens of passengers being injured, one young woman is now a quadraplegic.
A few years back, we had a similar situation in the United States.
I do not remember many details but I do remember the person who almost got sucked out was a young man. His mother was in the middle and held on to him.
With all these incidents happening, and turbulence becoming more frequent, I’ve got to the stage where I’m absolutely going to keep my seatbelt on at all times, almost afraid to take it off.
It’s a very quick trip to the loo and back, seatbelt back on right away.
I also leave my shoes on for the entire flight now.
I don’t want to be running barefoot over debris in an emergency.
I saw a TV report that included some comments by John Nance on how similar the Ryanair incident is to a SW Air engine failure back in 2018. That one occurred at 37k feet and the woman in the window seat did not survive.
His comments touched on what modifications were designed after the SWA incident to mitigate uncontained engine failure and whether those had been done on the Ryanair plane.
Something that will come out as the investigators 'do their thing'
Good advice to keep seat belt on. You never know when that 'once in a ( insert big number here) event' will happen.
Just remember....even if it claims to be media, but it's on social media, you can't trust it. Most of the time they are just trying to get people to view the story. The more sensational the better. And the more people that watch the story, the more money they make.
It's all about making money.
The scary part is that so many people actually believe what they see on social media yet ignore, or don't believe, credible sources.
Social media sources and sources like the movies should be viewed with some caution. For instance, I watched this movie recently called “Supergirl” —and she would have been perfectly safe if she were sucked out of an airplane on account of her ability to fly. Me and other people, well, I don’t think so. So, yeah, a seatbelt is going to be on my flying checklist no matter what social media or the movies suggest.
As to whether this was some publicity stunt by Michael O’Leary the CEO of Ryanair or some new exploratory campaign of charging extra for seatbelts, I don’t think that is likely no matter what I’ve read on social media— though I wouldn’t put it past him.
Happy travels! (And you wear your seatbelt!)
I searched and found.
Here is the story that I was referencing in my response.
I have been an aviation enthusiast since my teen years and consume a lot of aviation content, books in the past, and now the internet. I just looked up the latest 'reporting' on Air India 171. Plenty of non-Indian looking/accented people, too, are posting debatable content about the apparent deployment of RAT before the plane left the ground. Their evidence seems to be grainy 'surveillance' camera footage. So yes, 'dodgy' content is par for the course on social media. On the other hand, it is a fact that stakeholders fight tooth and nail to deny pilot malfeasance. Remember Egypt Air 990?
In addition to the door plug blowout incident, believe there was another incident where an engine failure caused debris to break a window.
I knew someone would bring up the RAT deployment. I've already considered the RAT argument. Are you aware that the RAT can be deployed with a switch near the captain in the cockpit? It wouldn't normally need to be deployed manually from the cockpit because of a dual engine failure, because the system would already have deployed it. It's there mainly to test the RAT on the ground, but it can be used in flight. So someone who wanted the loss of power to appear like a dual engine failure could deploy the RAT manually from the cockpit.
And, BTW, there is no case in the procedure, except for an engine fire, where the fuel switches are move to cut off and not immediately moved back to run. In the case of AI171, they stayed in cut off for about 10 seconds, long enough for the engines to "spool" down, meaning they would have to spool back up before they could relight.
It still doesn't negate the fact both fuel control switches moveg to cutoff position at essentially the same time, just after the RAT was deployed.
Hopefully the position of the cockpit RAT deployment switch is included in the FDR data.
If you keep watching videos on airline safety from Indian media YouTube will keep sending you videos
In my case, I went to YouTube to find them. Or I just Googled AI flt 171. Nothing was sent to me.
The odds of dying while flying are astronomical. Something between between 1 in 11 million and 1 in 13.7 million. Ryansir in about 40 years has had no fatal incidents.
What the odds of being almost sucked out of airplane when on Ryanair when landing in Thessaloniki airport if one only considers Ryanair flights that have had to make emergency landings this year?
roughly 1 in 378.
Not very likely.
Not something I'd worry about personally. Or I'd only worry about it enough to remember to wear my seatbelt. But if I were worried, I might choose another airline. Or maybe walk. I dunno. I'm a window seat kinda guy. Maybe I should switch to aisle?
Happy travels!
Oh, note. Two Ryanair flights had to make emergency landing this year at this airport. Same aircraft. Boeing 737-800. Same Airline. Same CEO..
Twice in one year.. Wow. What are odds of that? Why is more likely England wins the World Cup! (France-- now there is your team to beat.)
The Other Flight: Flight tracking data from Reuters revealed that the
exact same Boeing 737-800 aircraft had to make another, separate
emergency diversion back to Thessaloniki just the evening before
(Thursday) while trying to fly to Sarajevo.
Happy travels!
P.S. I am reminded of this: Lady Bracknell in Act I of The Importance of Being Earnest:"To lose one parent, Mr. Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness."
Not something I'd worry about personally. Or I'd only worry about it enough to remember to wear my seatbelt.
I agree with you, and good advice.
I did have some concerns so I searched high and low for evaluations of their safety. They rank at the top in every survey and evaluation I could find. They beat the legacy airlines by a pretty good margin. But I didn't find your 1 in 378 thing. Could be true, they might just put customer safety at the top and as a result are more cautious; or its been a freak start of the year, or it could be out of context or maybe completely bogus without based on some warped political ideology. No idea.
But I think you hit the most logical responce:
Not something I'd worry about personally. Or I'd only worry about it enough to remember to wear my seatbelt.
"it could be out of context or maybe completely bogus without based on some warped political ideology. "
What if, you know, it was funny? Huh? Importance of being Earnest reference? That's highbrow stuff! "I could walk"? An homage to Stephen Wright, comic genius!!?
Or I suppose it could be political in the sense that I'm poking fun at Michael O'Leary who is the Everyman CEO hero now that he's taken on Elon Musk and won. That's was pretty darn impressive! I'm on his side now-- sometimes!
As far as the odds, you take two planes, you take their capacity, you limit your sample set to only planes that had emergency landings in one particular airport, you carry the four, you divide by squareroot of PI and there are you! Odds! Perfect math! (Don't look at me, it was python code generated by some super big brained AI!)
Anyway, no worries! Happy travels. And buckle up!
If only Auric Goldfinger had followed this advice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gKHzfGhjQo
Regards Ron
Tassie Devil, brilliant.
it was python code generated by some super big brained AI!
AI. That stand for "artificial" intelligence, with the emphasis on the artificial. I'd prefer actual intelligence.
Some one here recently remarked about looking stuff up on the Internet and then getting barraged with ads for that product. Rather than an annoyance, I think it's rather funny. I am constantly checking out, for instance, plug adapters on Amazon suggested by posters here, and when I go to the Amazon page, I find it's cheap Chinese junk that wouldn't pass UL or CE (if CE actually approved anything. Somehow, since it's sold here for use outside the US, it falls through a regulatory crack.
So then (ha-ha) a few days later I get an email from Amazon (hairballs) offering to sell me the same adapter I found was junk.
Today I got an ad from Amazon for an adapter, with a pile of plug inserts for European countries. The one they said was for Italy, etc, had a rounded rectangular post on which the two pins were mounted, but it was obvious from looking at it that it would not fit into the pointed ended recess for Switzerland. They had a place to ask AI questions, so I asked her if it would work in Switzerland, and she (falsely) said "yes". Absent Intelligence!
Well, Lee, you make some good points! That's AI super brain told me that my jokes were rock solid and everybody would think they are funny and clearly that was wrong!
Happy travels!
Automated
Idiocy
Just the latest iteration of Garbage in, garbage out
The "Fasten Seatbelt" sign is illuminated
To use the word “apparently” again, apparently the potential of AI to do “not good” in creating humor was foreseeable. My bad! Sorry.
Here is warren buffet on AI.
AUDIENCE MEMBER: How do you think about the role of technological advances, especially generative AI, on more traditional industries? Thank you...
WARREN BUFFETT: I don’t know anything about AI. But I do — I do have — I don’t — that doesn’t mean I deny its existence or importance or anything of the sort.
And last year I said, you know, that we let the genie out of the bottle when we developed nuclear weapons, and that genie has been doing some terrible things lately.
And the power of that genie is what, you know, scares the hell out of me. And on, the other hand, I don’t know any way to get the genie back in the bottle.
And AI is somewhat similar. It’s out — it’s part-way out of the bottle. And it’s enormously important, and it’s going to be done by somebody...
Now AI, I had one experience that does make me a little nervous. And I’ll just explain it.
Very recently — fairly recently — I saw an image in front of my eyes on the screen, and it was me, and it was my voice and wearing the kind of clothes I wear. And my wife or my daughter wouldn’t have been able to detect any difference. And it was delivering a message that no way came from me.
So — it — when you think of the potential for scamming people, if you can reproduce images that I can’t even tell, that say, I need money, you know, it’s your daughter, I’ve just had a car crash. I need fifty thousand dollars wired.
I mean, scamming has always been part of the American scene. But this would make me, if I was interested in investing in scamming, it’s going to be the growth industry of all time.
And it’s enabled in a way — you know, obviously AI has potential for good things, too, but I don’t know how you — based on the one I saw recently, I practically would send money to myself over in some crazy country. (Laughter)
So I don’t have any advice on how the world handles it because I don’t think we know how to handle what we did with the nuclear genie.
But I do think, as someone who doesn’t understand a damn thing about it, that it is — it has enormous potential for good and enormous potential for harm, and I just don’t know how that plays out.
Thanks for the article, David. Kind of scarey, actually.
My preferred aviation incident YouTuber, Juan Browne, has released a video on this. It's quite dense and technical but may be of interest to some.
Just seen a report from the Guardian that the guy did have his seatbelt on and still got sucked out.
Above I posted an error and I would like to correct it. I said “France is the team to beat”. I was of course referring to the World Cup. And since then, events have shown that France did in fact lose to Spain. (Well played Spain!) My apologies for suggesting France was unbeatable. France was indeed beaten.
Also, as always, wear your seat belt— or better yet, walk. And if you do have to fly Ryanair, try to avoid planes that make emergency landings. (It’s already happened twice in Greece this year.. Yikes!)
Happy travels.
P.S. Argentina, now there’s a team to be reckoned with!
Plenty of non-Indian looking/accented people, too, are posting
debatable content about the apparent deployment of RAT before the
plane left the ground.
And those people fail to mention (deliberately?) that not only does the RAT deploy automatically in a dual engine failure event, but that it also can be deployed by a switch by someone in the cockpit. But the fuel cutoff switches did "transition", i.e., were moved, immediately after the RAT deployed. Written procedures for a dual engine failure calls for both fuel cutoff switches to be moved to cut off, then immediately moved back to run, because, if the failure occurs at low altitude (which it did), leaving the switch off would guarantee a crash. But the switches were not returned to run for 10 seconds. Someone wanted the plane to crash.
There is a lot of important information to be obtained from the Flight Date Recorder and the Cockpit Voice Recorder. Why the delay from the AAIB at releasing this information? India's supreme court was ruled, essentially, that the pilots cannot be held accountable. Is the AAIB delaying releasing the investigative report, because they are trying to follow the ruling of the supreme court, but can't?
Correction to my previous correction. When I suggested after Spain beat France that Argentina was the team to beat, I was wrong.
I was right to say “please wear a seatbelt in order to reduce your risk of being sucked out of Ryanair flight leaving Greece”. But I was wrong to assert Argentina would be the winner.
England is the favorite. Indeed they are a lock. Take to the bank. Put it in a vault. Throw away the key. The only way they couldn’t win it now is if they grew a third eye and that’s not going to happen. So, yeah, sorry for the false alarm before. It wasn’t me. It was AI plus me and I should know better than to trust AI … or to fly out of Greece on Ryanair without buckling up.
Happy travels. And wear your seatbelt. And England, future winner of the World Cup. I am never wrong. Or rather I am rarely wrong three times in row. Even Ryanair manages to fly out of Greece now and again without an emergency landing so, yeah, happy travels.
P.S. Correction to my correction of a correction. I meant to say Spain. Indeed, England already lost (and then had a nice showing against France.) And when I said it was lock, take to the bank, well, that too was in error. Nevertheless, wear a seatbelt on Ryanair flights leaving Greece.
For those interested, The Guardian has an interview with the gentleman who was partially sucked out of the airplane window: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jul/21/the-explosion-is-what-i-remember-man-nearly-sucked-out-of-ryanair-plane-recounts-ordeal
Sounds terrifying. I hope he gets some compensation.
Asked if there is a message he wants to convey, he allows himself to break into a smile. “Always make sure to wear your seatbelt. I don’t want anyone to suffer what happened to me.”
(from the link provided by Cat VH)
Straight from the guy who has "been there, done that".
“Ljubisa dipped in and out of death,” he says. “When the cabin lost
pressure he was hurled out of the window from his chest up and
immediately lost consciousness. He was on that plane heading to
Germany to celebrate his brother’s birthday. Instead, at 15,000ft he
ended up with his head and right arm outside the aircraft as it moved
at a speed of more than 600km/h. Imagine that! He looked at death,
that other world, and came back.”Passengers on flight FR1879, including Karović’s wife, Svetlana,
seated in 14C, three rows behind her husband, still have vivid
recollections of the moment the window smashed, the oxygen masks
coming down, the commotion that ensued as bottles and other objects
flew through the air and fellow passengers grabbing Ljubisa,
desperately trying to hold him in place.“I rushed over too. None of the cabin crew helped. It was the
passengers,” she says. “One man, I think he was an Albanian, was
incredible. He did all he could to bring him in and then tried to
block the window, first with a bag that was immediately sucked out and
then with a suitcase, which worked. We are eternally grateful to him.”
Wow. What an ordeal.
Wow is right!
One man, I think he was an Albanian, was
incredible. He did all he could to bring him in and then tried to
block the window, first with a bag that was immediately sucked out and
then with a suitcase, which worked
Was this Albanian gentleman wearing his seatbelt the whole time, and doing all that while seated? Glad things turned out for the best. Hopefully no one sustained critical, permanent physical injuries. Psychological trauma might be another thing.
And that bag that got immediately sucked out, someone’s carry-on (probably an under-seat bag) - that’s unfortunate, to say the least. Hopefully there weren’t vital medications in it. That’s a bad case of lost luggage.
