Passengers aboard a Ryanair flight from Thessaloniki to Memmingen, Germany experienced moments of sheer panic when a sudden cabin depressurization occurred after a window detached mid-flight.
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According to eyewitness accounts, a 61-year-old Serbian national was partially pulled out of the aircraft, with his head and shoulders protruding outside the fuselage. His wife, along with other passengers, managed to hold onto him and pull him back inside the cabin, preventing what could have been a fatal tragedy.
The incident occurred approximately ten minutes after the flight departed Thessaloniki en route to southern Germany. According to available flight tracking data, the Boeing aircraft dropped sharply by around 9,000 feet following the sudden cabin depressurization. Passengers told local media they heard a loud bang, after which the oxygen masks deployed and chaos erupted inside the cabin. “We immediately realized there had been a depressurization. There were screams, and for a moment I thought an emergency door had blown open,” one fellow passenger described.
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Eyewitnesses reported that the man, who had been seated next to the window, was violently pulled toward the opening that had formed, causing his head and shoulders to be thrust outside the aircraft.
🚨 COLD TERROR MID-AIR: Piece of engine shatters Ryanair window, passenger partially sucked out! ✈️💥
A holiday flight turned into an absolute living nightmare today (July 10, 2026) when Ryanair flight FR1879 from Greece to Germany suffered a catastrophic mid-air mechanical… pic.twitter.com/2WJNS5IQVy
— உடனுக்குடன் | Udanukudan (@Udanukudan) July 10, 2026
“Thankfully he hadn’t unbuckled his seatbelt,” one passenger stated, adding that his wife held onto his legs for approximately five minutes until other passengers rushed over to help pull him back into the cabin. Another passenger described the depressurization as so severe that passengers struggled to breathe, while the injured man was bleeding and lost consciousness several times, most likely due to oxygen deprivation and shock.
Video footage captured the damaged engine of the Ryanair Boeing 737, from which metal fragments were ejected and shattered a cabin window just minutes after takeoff from Thessaloniki, bound for Munich, Germany. The metal debris struck the fuselage and blew out the window adjacent to passenger seats, triggering a sudden cabin depressurization.