Passenger Beaten Up, Restrained After Trying To Open Door Mid-Air On Copa Airlines Flight

An unruly plane passenger who attempted to open the emergency door mid-flight was beaten up and restrained by fellow passengers on a Copa Airlines flight. According to the New York Post, the incident took place on Tuesday on a flight from Brazil to Panama. The flight had been going as planned until 30 minutes before landing a man rushed to the back of the plane with a plastic knife from his food tray and attempted to take a flight attendant hostage with the goal of opening the plane door. 

A video of the incident, shared on microblogging site X, shows the unruly passenger being restrained by other passengers after he attempted to open the plane door 30 minutes before landing. Another clip shows authorities boarding the aircraft and leading the man away in handcuffs with his face bloodied. 

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According to the Post, photojournalist Cristiano Carvalho witnessed the man’s attempt to open the door 30 minutes before landing. “A flight attendant started screaming, and another tried to hold him back, but couldn’t because he was too strong,” he said. 

“He went past the back emergency door after the warning,” Mr Carvalho recalled, adding, “Then he started moving forward and trying to open it.”

This is when passengers sprang to the rescue and fought the man to stop him from opening the plane’s emergency door, the 51-year-old recounted. He said that despite initially struggling due to the man’s strength, fellow passengers eventually succeeded in restraining the airhead after beating him bloody. 

“They beat him a lot until he almost lost consciousness,” Mr Carvalho described.

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In a statement, Copa Airlines claimed that after landing in Panama “the national security team entered the aircraft and removed the passenger, taking him to the judicial authorities”. 

The airlines praised both crewmembers and flyers for coming together to stop the unruly passenger from opening the plane door. “The crew acted quickly and, with the assistance of some passengers, applied the necessary safety protocols to control the situation until landing in Panama. Thanks to the professionalism of the crew, the safety of the flight and passengers was protected,” the airline spokesperson said. 

Meanwhile, this incident comes days after a man in the United States violently attacked a deaf and nonverbal passenger while he was sleeping until the cabin was spattered with blood on a United Airlines flight. Authorities identified the suspect as 44-year-old Everett Chal Nelson. He was charged with one count of assault by beating, striking, and wounding in the special aircraft jurisdiction of the US. If convicted, he could face up to a year in prison.