Twelve people were injured after turbulence struck a Qatar Airways flight from Doha to Dublin on Sunday, officials confirmed.
Six passengers and six crew were initially identified with injuries after the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner hit turbulence while flying over Turkey. Although flight QR017 landed safely at Dublin Airport shortly before 1 p.m. to a throng of waiting emergency services Sunday, eight people were eventually taken to a hospital, Dublin Airport confirmed.
The nature of the injuries is unclear, but passengers described crew members limping and others wearing bandages. The turbulence is said to have hit during food and drinks service.
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“The plane just seemed to go... stop—which it didn’t but then dropped, quite a severe drop,” one passenger said in a video published by The Guardian.
“Fortunately the captain got it under control quite quickly, because I was thinking, ‘Oh, it’s going to keep falling.’ But unfortunately there were a couple of passengers that didn’t have seatbelts on in front of us so they were thrown out of their seats and hit their head.”
Another passenger, identified as Conor, told Irish broadcaster RTÉ, “We saw the flight attendant go up in the air and come straight back down.” His traveling companion, Emma, said she was half-asleep when the plane suddenly dropped, describing “the look of panic on everyone’s faces.”
Passenger Cathal, who was traveling home to Ireland from Doha, told RTÉ he was eating dinner and said the seatbelt signs were off just prior to the incident. “Just food all over the plane, on the ceiling, everywhere,” he said of the scene afterward.
In a statement posted to X, Qatar Airways confirmed the flight had landed safely, adding, “A small number of passengers and crew sustained minor injuries in flight and are now receiving medical attention. The matter is now subject to an internal investigation. The safety and security of our passengers and crew are our top priority.”
Despite the claims of minor injuries, some passengers said they were left terrified by the ordeal.
“To be honest, I’m still shivering,” a man named Mufassal Ali said after the flight, according to the New York Post. “That was the worst 15 seconds of my life.” Ali said he had witnessed a few people “literally flying in the plane.”
Another passenger, Philomena Prendergast, described contemplating her mortality during the incident, which lasted less than a minute. “It was so scary at the time, you just don’t know—is this it, or not?” she said.
“Some of the flight attendants had scratches to their face, ice to their face… one girl had a sling on her arm,” a third passenger, Emma Rose Power, recounted.
Flight operations were unaffected at Dublin Airport, Qatar Airways said in a statement. The return flight to Doha was still scheduled, though delayed.
The incident comes less than a week after a 73-year-old man died on a Singapore Airlines flight when the aircraft hit extreme turbulence, while 22 passengers suffered spine and spinal cord injuries, six others skull and brain injuries, and another 13 suffered bone, muscle, or other injuries.
