U.S. aviation safety officials announced Thursday that they are now heading the investigation into a frightening incident aboard a Ryanair flight departing Greece, during which a window broke loose and partially pulled a passenger out of the aircraft before others were able to bring him back inside.
The National Transportation Safety Board said that after reviewing the aircraft’s flight path more carefully, investigators concluded the event took place within Greek airspace — not over the Republic of North Macedonia as they had originally thought.
Under international aviation rules, Greece’s Hellenic Air and Rail Safety Investigation Authority was permitted to transfer control of the investigation to the NTSB. The U.S. federal agency confirmed it accepted the handover and is now directing the probe, with Greek authorities participating in a supporting role.
The alarming event unfolded on July 10 aboard a morning flight departing the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki and bound for Memmingen, near Munich. The flight was operated by Malta Air, a subsidiary of Ryanair, which is Europe’s largest budget airline.
The passenger involved, a 61-year-old man whose name was not released, sustained neck and shoulder injuries along with friction burns, according to a Greek hospital official. It was unclear as of Thursday whether he was still receiving hospital care.
The NTSB had previously stated it was informed the flight turned around due to “a right engine issue and cabin decompression.” Ryanair has not publicly commented on the engine issue. When contacted by email about the matter, the airline repeated its earlier statement, which only referenced the window coming loose as the reason the plane returned to Thessaloniki.
Passengers who spoke to Greek media described hearing a loud bang, followed by oxygen masks dropping from above and the plane beginning to lose altitude. Short videos recorded inside the cabin and shared by Radio Thessaloniki showed passengers with oxygen masks on after the cabin lost pressure. One clip appeared to show the blown-out window, with a nearby passenger wearing a mask. A third video, seemingly recorded after the plane had landed, showed emergency responders working in the aisle.
Shye Gilad, a former airline captain who now teaches at Georgetown University’s business school, explained that a window blowing out would trigger rapid decompression — a sudden drop in cabin pressure that can produce a brief but intense suction effect near the opening before conditions stabilize.
“The seat belt can help in those first few seconds. It’s a difference maker and people should keep their seat belts fastened at all times,” Gilad said. He added that incidents like this are “very rare” because “it takes a lot to breach a cabin.”
Flight data shows the aircraft — a Boeing 737-800 that was delivered new to Ryanair in 2008 — had been climbing through 15,000 feet (4,570 meters) approximately six minutes after takeoff before rapidly descending to around 6,000 feet (1,830 meters). Flight-tracking service Flightradar24 reported the plane held at the lower altitude for about 30 minutes to burn off fuel before returning to Thessaloniki roughly an hour after it had originally departed.
Ryanair stated in its public comments that one passenger requested and received medical attention after the plane landed, and that a replacement aircraft was later arranged to carry passengers on to Germany.
