On July 10, 2026, Ryanair flight 1879 took off from Thessaloniki, Greece, bound for Memmingen, Germany. There were 149 passengers and six crew members on board. Just minutes after takeoff, the Boeing 737-800 suffered a failure in its right engine that would completely change the course of the flight.
According to the preliminary report by the United States National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), one of the engine’s fan blades broke off during the climb. The fragments pierced the fuselage and damaged one of the cabin windows, causing the aircraft to rapidly depressurize.
Ljubisa Karović, 61, was seated in 11F, next to the window. When it broke away, his head and one of his arms were left outside the aircraft. His wife, Svetlana Grković, was sitting beside him and managed to hold him by the legs with the help of other passengers. Karović lost consciousness several times during the most dangerous moments.
While some passengers tried to keep him inside the aircraft, oxygen masks fell from the ceiling and the crew began emergency procedures. The pilots decided to return to Thessaloniki, where the aircraft landed without further complications. Karović was hospitalized with serious injuries and later said that memories of the incident continued to affect him physically and psychologically.
The investigation is still trying to determine why the engine blade broke off. The report found bird remains in the engine and recorded four possible bird strikes involving that same engine during the previous year, although inspections carried out after those incidents had not detected any prior damage. The case remains under investigation.