SerpApi.Org
Ryanair crew failed to help a passenger when he was nearly sucked through a window after it shattered mid-flight, it has been claimed.
Ljubiša Karović, 61, from Serbia, fainted several times after he was dragged into the hole during a flight from Thessaloniki, Greece, to an airport near Munich on July 9.
His wife, Svetlana Grković, who was seated three rows behind, rushed to help as the window smashed and oxygen masks dropped from the ceiling of the cabin.
Ryanair insisted its cabin crew had done a “phenomenal job” in responding to the incident involving Mr Karović, before telling The Telegraph that it was conducting a formal investigation.
However, Ms Grković said it was fellow passengers – and not cabin crew – that saved her husband.
She told the Guardian: “I rushed over too. None of the cabin crew helped. It was the passengers. 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.”
It is thought Mr Karović was “half in and half out of the plane” for up to two minutes.
He said: “They tell me I fainted twice, and again inside the plane, and that my face was briefly swollen and deformed because of the pressure, the rush of air. My wife reminds me about that.”
Vasilis Tsiaras, Mr Karović’s lawyer, said his client “dipped in and out of death”.
The lawyer added: “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. He looked at death, that other world, and came back.”
Mr Tsiaras said: “We have no complaint with the pilot, who followed the safety protocols and dealt with the situation very well.
“My client fainted two or three times, once outside the aircraft when he was partially sucked out of the window, and twice inside when, again, he lost consciousness. At no point did the cabin crew offer to help.
“It was the other passengers who rallied and gave Ljubisa water.”
He added that the airline had not even contacted Mr Karović or his wife to offer any assistance. But it had contacted their son, who booked the flights, about rebooking.
In a statement to the Guardian, the airline said: “As soon as the aircraft descended to a safe altitude our cabin crew attended to and assisted Mr Karović, moving him to alternate seats (beside his wife) and arranged for a doctor onboard to sit with them until the aircraft landed safely back in Thessaloniki.
“They also arranged to have medical assistance standing by on landing in Thessaloniki.”
Mr Karović was discharged from hospital this week and is wearing a neck brace.
Doctors have told him he will have to wear it for six weeks, after which they will decide if surgery is needed.
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Mr Karović said he should be offered compensation rather than “emails that have focused on rebooking the flight”.
And he urged other passengers to always wear their seatbelt, adding: “I am lucky. My head and neck still hurt, but I am alive. It could have been the seatbelt, the fact that I was still strapped in. But maybe it is fate. I believe in God and I thank him every day.”
