Moment pilot asks passengers to ‘pray’ as plane rattles violently

Passengers had to endure over two, terrifying hours sitting on a rattling plane, fearing the worst. The low-cost Air Asia X flight, began violently shaking over the Indian Ocean on a flight from Perth, Australia, to Malaysia. The Airbus A330 had over 350 passengers on board.

The pilot told passengers he was “scared” and to “pray”, twice. Terrifying footage shown on CNN shows the seats and passengers shuddering in the cabin as they tried to appear brave. 

One can be seen holding a pillow over his face, clearly nervous. Many said it “felt like being inside a washing machine”. 

You can hear the metal rattling and worse still, see the engines shaking violently. The shuddering went on for nearly two hours, with frightened passengers hanging on for dear life.  

Suddenly, they heard a loud bang. Passenger Samad Monfard said that the captain had said “one of the plates on the left engine was missing”. 

People were crying and pulling out their life jackets. “We thought there was a good chance we were going to go down”, another said. Two friends on board tried to keep it light saying, “We’re having 50 million beers when we get back”.

The plane was forced to return to Australia. Once on the ground, passengers gave their accounts of their terrifying experience:

One said: “The plane was really, really limping home. It was shuddering, shuddering, shuddering.” Another young passenger who looked remarkably calm, said, “I thought the whole plane was going to go plummeting down.”

The low-cost airline said the event was down to “a technical issue”. It added: “The safety of our guests is our utmost priority”.