If you needed another reason to keep your seatbelt fastened even when the sign is off, here it is. A Malta Air Boeing 737 operating for Ryanair turned a routine flight from Greece to Germany into an absolute horror movie Friday when a window shattered mid-flight and a passenger was partially pulled through the opening.
As Trending Politics reported, the plane had just taken off from Thessaloniki, Greece, headed for Memmingen, Germany, when the window failed shortly after departure. The cabin depressurized, oxygen masks dropped, and a Serbian man, reportedly around 60 years old, had his head and neck pulled through the busted window while the aircraft was thousands of feet in the air. Fellow passengers grabbed him and pulled him back inside, which is the kind of teamwork you never want to have to participate in.
The man's seatbelt is the unsung hero of this story. Without it, we would be talking about a very different outcome. A passenger named Christina told Radio Thessaloniki, as reported by the BBC, that the scene was pure chaos. "We immediately realized there had been a decompression," Christina said. "There were screams. ... For a moment I thought someone had accidentally opened the emergency door. The masks dropped and there was a strong smell. The head and shoulders of one passenger were outside the window. Fortunately, he hadn't taken off his seat belt."
Fortunately indeed. That seatbelt did more work in those few seconds than most seatbelts do in their entire lifetime.
The plane managed to divert back to Thessaloniki and land safely. Ryanair confirmed that one passenger requested and received medical attention on the ground, and the airline arranged a replacement aircraft so passengers could continue their journey to Germany. Because nothing says "get back on the horse" like boarding another plane right after someone nearly got vacuumed out of the last one.
One passenger told reporters they believed pieces from the plane's engine may have broken off and struck the window, causing it to shatter. Ryanair has not commented on that claim, which is exactly the kind of silence that inspires total confidence. The aircraft was a Boeing 737, one of the most commonly used commercial jets in the world, and the exact cause of the window failure remains under investigation.
The extent of the injured passenger's condition has not been disclosed. Whatever his injuries, they are significantly less severe than what would have happened without that seatbelt and without the passengers next to him acting fast.
So the next time that little chime goes off and the flight attendant reminds you to keep your seatbelt fastened while seated, maybe just do it. You are not tougher than rapid decompression at altitude. Nobody is.
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