Passengers helped stop knife attack in cockpit of Israel-bound plane

0:00Hello, I'm Celia Hatton. Welcome to NewsHour from the BBC World Service coming to you live from our studio in Central London. Today, we're unraveling what happened on board passenger flight FZ1073. It took off from Dubai Airport just after 3am local time, carrying around 150 people. Most were Israelis. The flight was headed to Tel Aviv. But approximately 2.5 hours into the flight, something went very wrong. An emergency code was signaled, and that code was briefly switched to a hijacking alert. Videos, widely circulating on social media, are helping us piece together what happened on board that flight before its unscheduled landing in Saudi Arabia. This is said to be the moment the plane took a rapid plunge.

1:00You can hear a distressed woman saying in Hebrew, what is going on? Another graphic video appears to show one of the plane's pilots who was stabbed, apparently being held down by several people around him. Some of them look like passengers. There are reports that the two pilots on the plane were fighting, and the crew appealed for help from the passengers to intervene. We need to read her. No, no, no. No, we need to read for you. But end for you. You want to read? Good for you. Yes. You want to read? You're saying the same. It's good for you. Yes. It's good for you. Yes. Take it, my name's here. I'm a little deaf. So you heard some words there in English, and in Hebrew, we can now hear people saying, we're in the cockpit guarding over. We were attacked. We're guarding the pilot. A second person then says, they attacked us on the plane. They tried to kill the pilot.

2:02We took control of something that's indecisurable. Then someone says, tried to murder him. Then we hear, grow, well done, film everything. We're standing here. Nobody gets past the cockpit door. And that's the end of that video. One of the passengers on the flight, Al Morgh-Itali, explained what had been happening. I spoke with several people who were in the cockpit, and there are quite a few versions. It's unclear how the cockpit door was opened. Whether someone from the crew opened it, so help could come, or if it was forced open, it is unclear. What is clear is that there were two pilots in the front, one stabbed the other, and there were two spare pilots who were supposed to operate the next flight. The relief pilots are European, one of them British, who entered and pulled the aircraft up, pulled the yoke, stabilized the plane, and landed us in Saudi Arabia. Hebrew media outlets have published video showing passengers clapping and singing, as the

3:07fly Dubai plane lands at Tabuk airport in Saudi Arabia close to 7am local time. Let's take a listen. Well, sounds of relief for all on board. Let's speak live now with our correspondent John Donnison, who's live for us on route to Tel Aviv's airport. John, it's a very fast-changing story, and a lot of speculation is circulating around what happened on that flight. But what's the very latest that you're hearing? Well, as we're getting more detail from the 170 or so passengers who were on board, we are getting really what appears to be an extraordinary and a terrifying picture, because initially you said in your introduction there was an alert saying that the plane had been hijacked, but what now seems a very real possibility is that it was not the passengers who were trying to hijack the plane, but one of the pilots. So there has been a fight between the pilot and the co-pilot inside the cockpit.

4:12All the while the plane is plummeting very fast. We think around 17,000 feet, which is more than 5,000 meters in just a couple of minutes. And what some of the passengers have said is that the crew called for assistance. Passengers were then able to get into the cockpit where they found one of the pilots was suffering from stab wounds, and they were able to tackle one of the pilots and tie them up and secure them. And then as we heard there, it does seem there were two pilots on the plane who would use to fly a later flight, and it was they who were able to get the plane leveled and fly safely back to Saudi Arabia, and all the passengers are safe and well. Remarkable, John. What are we hearing from the Israeli government? And also the initial Israeli response. I understand that fighter jets were scrambled. Yes, so when we first get reports of this first thing this morning, the Israeli said that

5:16they scrambled fighter jets, and so had the Saudis to escort this plane back to Saudi Arabia. We think there were around about 100 Israelis on board, including more than 20 children. Now we got a statement quite early this morning from the Prime Minister's office Benjamin Netanyahu saying the situation was under control, and efforts were now being made to get the Israelis back to Israel from Saudi Arabia. We've just had a statement within the last hour or so from the far-right National Security Minister, it's Amar Ben Gavir, and he has said that this was a terrorist attack, and he said that the plan was to deliberately crash the plane and kill all the passengers on board. Now he presented no evidence to support that, but certainly investigators are going to be looking into the backgrounds of the pilots and what possible motives they might have had if that was indeed what one of them was intending to do. John, and as we should say, yes, we're still verifying reports and trying to pick our

6:17part ourselves, what actually happened on that flight. But any more indications as to why the plane continued flying for so long, it didn't land until close to 7 a.m. local time, and also why it landed in Saudi Arabia. Well, I think, look, they were flying from Dubai, so where they'd reached in their journey, it was perhaps quicker to get back to Saudi Arabia than to continue on to Tel Aviv. And once I guess the situation had been secured on the plane, it's possible that they just thought, well, we need to get back to on the ground as quickly and possible as possible. And Saudi Arabia was the place to do that. OK, thanks for speaking to us, John, on a very busy day reporting day for you. Thank you. That was John Donnison speaking to us from Jerusalem. Well, let's stay with this story and get more analysis on what might have happened and what's next.

7:18Emma Henderson, MBE is a former airline captain and aviation expert. She joins me now from Scotland. Emma, you've been hearing since the listening, since the top of the program, you've just heard what we reported and also what John had to say. What are your thoughts at this point from the information that we have? What do you believe happened? Well, it's certainly a very shocking story and one that as a pilot, you never hope to have to witness yourself, of course. And yes, I have been following it since this morning when, you know, an obvious of the story has changed significantly since it was first reported and we're getting more and more reports from eyewitnesses who are on board now as well. I think the important thing is, as you said earlier on, there's a lot of speculation, a lot of people are waiting in to say what they think happened and we have to stick to the facts. So we know that the aircraft landed safely into book. It diverted instead of carrying on to Tel Aviv. We know that there were two pilots in the flight deck who have been injured and there is a

8:24suspicion that one pilot has attacked another and there are more and more reports of that coming from eyewitnesses on the plane. We also know that there were two other pilots on board the aircraft, which is extremely fortunate because they were able to take over and land the plane into book. And I don't even want to think about what would have happened if that hadn't been the case. So it does seem like it's an altercation between the two pilots. Now we don't know what the motivation for that is. But certainly whatever happened in that cockpit caused the aircraft to depart from its normal flight path. It was cruising at 34,000 feet and then it that was a huge drop in altitude. So that does indicate that that's not something the aircraft would ordinarily do. That would require human intervention for that. Okay. And would it have required human intervention then to stabilize that plane, meaning one of those pilots, those relief pilots who were in the back of the plane, must have would have been

9:26able to get to the front of the plane to stabilize it. Can we can we read that into the fact that the plane was able to stabilize after plunging? Yes. I mean, once the aircraft has been put into a sort of nose dive like the I'd steep descent like that. It would require intervention in order to be and there is a report that the relief pilot was the one who pulled back on the yoke, which is the control, how you control the aircraft in that in that particular aircraft type, was able to pull back on the yoke and stabilize the flight path. So and level out that descent. But you know, if you then think about what was happening, you're in a very steep descent, trying to wrestle people out of the out of their pilot seats. And these other two pilots were reportedly sitting at the back of the aircraft. That's an awful lot to happen in a very short space of time. So it will have been terrifying for particularly for the two pilots on board who will have known that something was wrong and will have known they had to intervene and do something about it. Emma, we know after September 11 that only people flying

10:31the plane can enter the cockpit. So how would anyone else have gotten in? Well, there are two ways that you can go into the cockpit. One is for the pilots to let you in by unlocking the door and that's a normal procedure. So if cabin crew want to enter the cockpit, which they're allowed to do during a flight, then they call the pilots, tell them they're going to come in and then the pilots will unlock the door and allow them to come in. So open it from the inside and the other way is there is a way for crew to enter the flight deck if they had to in an emergency. But that's not something that would be accessible to passengers. So the reports were getting are that the passengers broke into the cockpit, but I'm not sure if that is speculation at the moment. We don't exactly what happened. The fact that the pilot had called for help would indicate to me that they had perhaps unlocked the cockpit door in order to let somebody in. Because that's less dangerous than staying in the cockpit with somebody who's wielding a knife.

11:33If that indeed that's what was happening. Okay. And it appears someone dialed or pressed the hijacking code from inside the cockpit. Is that a code you'd use if there was a fight that happened between the pilot and the code pilot? Well, the code that was initially used was 7700, which is the emergency code that indicates to air traffic control. There's a problem with your aircraft and they they will clear all of the air traffic out of the way and they will prioritize you as a result of that. The hijack code, I've been thinking about this throughout the morning actually. If I was in that situation, I might not want to alert the other person that I was initiating the hijack code. So the fact that it was only very brief indicates that either they were dialing through the numbers to get to the 7700 code or somebody had put the 7500 code in which is the hijack code in order to alert air traffic control, but maybe then switched it back so that it wasn't too obvious. It's very difficult to know and all of this will come out in the investigation. Emma, thank you very

12:37much. That was Emma Henderson, a former airline captain and aviation expert speaking to us from Scotland. Just to say the BBC News website has just updated to say that a fly Dubai recovery plane is at Tobok Airport to pick up stranded passengers there. Coming up, Stevie Wonder's album turns songs in the key of life turns 50. We'll hear a tribute to it. This was the culmination of an extremely unprecedented prolific run of records that Stevie Wonder made in the mid 70s. It was like a four-year period where he knocked out five records. There were all just absolutely brilliant and it culminated with this ginormous, you know, two album plus an extra EP set, songs in the key of life. That's coming up just over half an hour's time and the stories were tracking in our newsroom this hour in Israel-bound flight as landed safely in Saudi Arabia after a fight broke out between

13:38pilots triggering a hijacking alert. And Russia's carried out another massive overnight attack on Ukraine's Kiev region, hitting energy infrastructure and residential buildings. Listening to news hour on the BBC World Service, we heard several hours ago that several executives from the largest AI companies in the United States have signed a voluntary agreement to put controls on artificial intelligence. The US President Donald Trump made the announcement on Tuesday after a meeting with tech bosses at the White House, speaking with reporters afterwards, he said government-imposed guardrails were not needed to regulate AI. These models are very complex. And again, I believe they're going to be used for the good and when they're not, we're going to be able to nap them. But there's going to be a tremendous self-policing aspect. We're also thinking about forming a committee of sorts where we put maybe 10 people on that

14:42committee, it could be from that group so that we can, so the committee can watch over the whole enterprise. Well, this news from Washington comes as we're hearing fresh reports that a popular Chinese AI tool, Kimi, was persuaded to explain to researchers how to make biological weapons and how to carry out assassinations. Kimi is made by moonshada, a major AI company based in Beijing. It says it's now in discussion with Mindguard, the research company that revealed it could convince Kimi to evade its own safety limits. Peter Garrigan is the founder of Mindguard. He joins me now. Peter, tell us what Mindguard discovered about moonshads Kimi models? So, Mindguard was able to successfully jailbreak these models and jailbreaking is when you remove the safety constraints of AI models. What happened is that you can get the model to talk freely about topics including making saring gas, planning assassinations, creating weaponry, but also how

15:48to conduct cyber attacks against other users. Remarkable, do you know if the suggestions your researchers were able to get from Kimi on how to carry out an assassination or how to make a bio weapon would actually work? So, I am a university professor, but unfortunately I'm not the head of the League of Assassins, so I can't actually comment about whether those steps and also like in chemistry they would do. I am, however, an expert in cyber security and the actions it took and the information it gave to us were incredibly credible in terms of actually the cyber attacks can will and actually did work against itself. So, moonshot, that's the company based in Beijing that makes Kimi has said it's now in discussions with your company. Can you tell me about those discussions at N moonshads response? Yes, great. So, it's very common for company like Mindguard, is when you discover these vulnerabilities, you tell and inform the vendor to help and fix it.

16:49So, it not being held at gunpoint, actually, is we want to help them make their technology better. So, we sent them the instructions about the type of issues we found to work with it. They were quite silent for a long time until the story broke today. They'd been come back to us just before and now we're sharing the type of issues we found and hopefully they'll go towards actually fix it. How important is it that this model that Kimi was made by a Chinese company? Do you think that AI bots originating in China are more dangerous somehow? My personal view is not every single AI model has its weakness in different ways. If you look at the news about these models and even the vendors themselves and are talking about after many years about weaponization and doing cyber attacks, it's a fundamental limitation but also a capability of more of themselves. If you have a piece of software that's highly capable and make patterns, it can be used for good things, but also use for bad things as well.

17:52Okay, Peter, thank you very much for speaking with us. That was Peter Garrigan, founder of Mindguard speaking about that latest news that a Chinese made AI bot. It was able to, the researchers were able to break through its guardrails. Let's go to the US state of Tennessee now where in less than two hours time, Christa Pike is set to be executed by injection. For a murder, she committed when she was 18. She and her then boyfriend beat, tortured and murdered another teenager. 19 year old Colleen Slammer who they met at a job training camp for troubled teens. Pike's legal team has been fighting nonstop to halt the execution on several grounds. We'll hear more about in a moment. But on Monday, Tennessee's governor Bill Lee denied her clemency petition and yesterday, the US Supreme Court rejected a request to stop the execution on the grounds. It would be

18:52unconstitutionally cruel. There is one chance Pike's execution could be stopped if Tennessee's federal court of appeal accepts her team's last-minute arguments for the case to be reexamined. But if that fails, she'll be the first woman to be executed in Tennessee in more than 200 years. A warning to our audience here, they might find parts of our next interview, distressing. Professor Sandra Babcock is an expert on gender and the death penalty at Cornell Law School in New York State who has worked on Christa Pike's defense. Professor Babcock, I know that you are fighting to prevent this execution. What are the three main factors you say mean that Christa Pike deserves clemency? Thank you for that question. Christa is a very, very unique person in the sense that she was only 18 at the time of the crime

19:55that landed her on death row. And she was also a survivor of extreme child sexual abuse and rape. She had at the time of the crime untreated by polar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder brought about by her history of sexual violence. And all of that information was relevant to understanding the crime that she committed. It was a very vicious crime, though, calling Slammer's body was mutilated. The mother of calling Slammer has said she wants the execution to be carried out. Can you understand that? Yeah, of course I can understand that. I think anytime someone harms someone we love, we want to inflict pain upon them. That is a very natural human instinct. But the death penalty and the legal system are not designed as vehicles for

21:02personal vengeance. The death penalty, at least in theory, is supposed to be reserved for the most irredeemable and depraved killers. People who have no chance of redemption. That does not describe an 18-year-old teenager who was struggling with the consequences of rape and untreated mental illness at the time of the crime. You've said you don't think that Christa Pike would get the same sentence today. I do not. For one thing, as an 18-year-old, we know now that her brain was no different than a 17-year-old. And in fact, Christa was an immature 18-year-old. When you look at pictures of her, when you see video of her, she still had acne on her face. She was, she had stuffed animals in her jail cell four years after she was imprisoned. She was someone who we now know lacked

22:07the capacity of an adult to understand the consequences of their actions and to reign in their impulses. Okay. That combined with her history of sexual violence would have led a prosecutor not to seek the death penalty or a jury not to impose it. Okay. Sandra Bauphoek, thank you for speaking with us. Sandra Bauphoek speaking to us there about Christa Pike's execution in Tennessee, which is scheduled to go ahead in about 90 minutes time. We'll keep you up to date if there are any legal breakthroughs or a stay of that execution. You're listening to NewsHour on the BBC World Service. Please stay with us. Welcome back to NewsHour. Coming up, a special report from Gaza where the BBC has been filming across the summer to see how children are coping despite the conflict there. We'll hear

23:09from the father of six-year-old Brazil, who's had more than 20 operations since an airstrike injured her in late July and killed her sister. I asked them, where is Ratil? Nobody answered. I asked my wife's cousins, where is Ratil? They said in the morgue, I couldn't hold myself together. They used to play together all the time. It's only been two or three days since she started eating again. I'm afraid that if my daughter stays in Gaza, she'll die. They're coming up in a few minutes time. But first, Nigerian dancer Benjamin Daniel Gabriel has danced for 168 hours. That's seven days in an attempt to set a new world record for the longest dance marathon by an individual. The attempt took place at Freedom Park in Lagos with crowds gathering over the week to watch her men dance along to Afrobeats, Zook and Jazz. His claim to the title has now been submitted to the Guinness World Records and is awaiting confirmation. Benjamin, also known as

24:11Ben Dancer, spoke to the BBC just after he'd finished. I'm feeling great. I'm feeling fulfilled. I was on tour a couple of times with my band, which is Mydecouti. So Mydecouti is a grandson of Fella. And Fella is the originator of the Afrobeats genre. So I look at how the eels and then the things that affect the dance industry here, over here in Nigerian Africa, Matthew, we need to bring a change in the night. I asked myself if I got the change, then the change has the beginning of me. I needed to show the world the beauty of the African culture through dance because for the entire seven days I was wearing different outfits, different costumes, different traditional attires from different parts of Africa. Most of the dances are African indigenous dances. So they were dances from

25:17different cultures of Nigerian to show the form of unity because while I was dancing, different tribes from different parts of Africa came. In fact, some of my friends came from Ben and Republic, some came from Paris, some came from London too as well. I had different people from the different part of the world. So you see dance united us because nobody was asking where you from, what's your region. And we're all bent on doing dancing together with one music. For me, dance is not just entertainment, dance is spiritual. And as spiritual as it can be, dances are custodians of culture. That was the Nigerian dancer Benjamin Daniel Gabriel, also known as Ben dancer, who danced for 168 hours straight, seven days straight in an attempt to beat the Guinness World Record. Stay with us on

26:18New Zaur. I'm Celia Hatton with NewsHour coming to you live from our studio in London. Nearly a year after a ceasefire was supposed to end the fighting in Gaza, BBCI investigations has been filming for the last few months through Gaza's summer to reveal how children are coping. The Hamas-Ran Gaza Health Ministry says over 1400 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks since last October. The Israeli military disputes this. Doctors say Israel's restrictions on vital medical supplies have placed further strain on patients, including children like Rasiel Al-Balawi, BBC World Services Amir Nader reports. Six-year-old Rasiel is getting ready for skin graft surgery. Earlier she had seizures caused by a straplough fragment in her brain, which her doctors cannot remove.

27:21On July 30, Rasiel was sleeping with her family in their tent, an al-Mawasi camp in southern Gaza, when witnesses say they were hit by an Israeli air strike. She was injured along with her mother and brother. Her nine-year-old sister Ratiel was killed. Rasiel's father Mahmoud watches over her in the hospital bed, the distress palpable on both their faces. I asked them, where is Ratiel? Nobody answered. I asked my wife's cousins, where is Ratiel? They said, in the milk, I couldn't hold myself together. They used to play together all the time. It's only been two or three days since she started eating again. I'm afraid that if my daughter stays in Gaza, she'll die. Rasiel has had more than 20 operations in order to clean wounds that keep getting infected. MSF's doctor, Awani Rajafarawi, at Nasr Hospital, is looking after her.

28:23She's a resistant bacteria, so the solution is to try and clean the wounds every day or every other day, washing them in the operation room and trying as much as possible to control the infections. Dr Al-Jafarawi explains the long-term consequences of the failure of key antibiotics he is seeing on his ward. Al-Al-Madan Bayid. In the long run, people's immunity weakens. A patient would need to undergo surgery every day or every other day. Over the coming years, you will see the number of amputees rise daily, even if the war stops. No. What effect is the harm? Israel says it allows medicines to enter Gaza without restriction, including antibiotics, but multiple humanitarian organisations and medical staff across Gaza have told the BBC that there are major shortages of essential drugs. Other factors that risk people's health are also at play. Rats and other pests have spread. Neighborhood volunteer Mahmoud sprays pesticides around the rubble where he lives. The kids have developed severe allergies from these rodents and insects.

29:26They started bringing us diseases we had never heard of before. Honestly, we are sick of this life. For children in Gaza, bond barbed-mount is an ever-present threat. On September 1st, the Israel Defense Forces carried out a series of airstrikes during a raid near a school. At least four people were killed, including two children. The idea says that it was part of an operation to capture the head of Hamas' internal security service. Doha Kudde is a teacher at the school. What war is over? There were over 200 children in my kindergarten right now. We were all evacuated from the building under bombardment. From the house to the house. September 1st was also 14 years old Lara's birthday. She was supposed to go to school that day, but didn't, because her mother wanted to celebrate with her at home. There is school tomorrow. Are you going to go? No, seriously. You don't want to go? No, why? Just because.

30:28Lara's face is tearing up. She has already lost her father who was killed while trying to get food for the family a year ago. Her mother tries to comfort her. I mean, it'll be a day or two and after that things come down. Yes. What do you mean? Yes. Why are you crying? I'm fed up. What are you fed up with? Life. Haya. UNICEF says that almost every child in Gaza requires urgent mental health and psychosocial support. Back at Marshall Hospital, Rasiel, while waiting for a medical evacuation, has a new doll. She's named her after her dead sister, Ratiel. The IDF says that they have no record of a strike that hit her family and regrets any harm to civilians. A few days ago, Rasiel's father called the BBC to say they've been given permission to leave Gaza for treatment. But for the thousands of other children who are injured and traumatized, the wait for essential medicines or even a medical evacuation continues.

31:32That report by Amir Nader and the BBCI Investigations team. Well, we've spent a lot of time on news-hour talking about the immediate threat posed by wildfires to the people forced to flee from their homes to fire crews who fight them in the surrounding environment. But we don't often think what the lingering air pollution they cause. And the fact that those pollutants, including ground level ozone, can travel far beyond the original fire zone. Wildfires and heat waves both exacerbated by climate change, as well as natural and human cost emissions all contribute to a hazardous ground level air pollution. And a report out today says it's now affecting nearly 40% of the world's population. Mark Perrington is a senior scientist at the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service in Bond, Germany, in behind-to-date's report. First of all, what is ozone and why is it a concern? Ozone is a molecule that consists of three oxygen atoms. Most of the ozone in the atmosphere is found in the stratosphere, in the ozone layer, about 90%. But there's still ozone in what we call the

32:34troposphere, which is the part we live in. And at ground level, ozone molecules are a very harmful pollutant. They have impacts on respiratory health and cardiovascular health. And it's a complicated molecule to monitor because it's not emitted itself, but it's produced through chemical reactions of what we call precursors, things like nitrogen oxides, nitrogen dioxide, and volatile organic compounds. And those are both emitted from human activities and from natural sources. And then in the presence of sunlight, chemical reactions take place, and that produces ozone. So Mark, how exactly is this linked to climate change? The role of climate change is that if we're seeing more frequent heat waves and longer heat waves, typically we have high pressure, fairly stable atmospheric conditions, low wind speeds, less clouds, so there's more sunshine. And the stable atmospheric conditions mean that these precursor emissions can accumulate. And then with the sunlight and the higher temperatures making

33:36the chemical reactions more efficient, then this can really generate much higher ozone pollution. Okay, and you analyzed levels of this ground level ozone pollution worldwide in the first eight months of this year. What did you find? So one of the main things that we found was that almost 40% of the world's population is exposed to the worst ozone pollution. And we've shown some breakdown of this continent by continent, and also to show this can affect different parts of the world at different times of year. Are some parts of the world really suffering more than others? So really the highest pollution, the most people that affected it, in places where the population density is really high, that means there's a lot of people exposed to the ozone, but also there's a lot of activities, a lot of industry, traffic and pollution sources in those places which provide these compounds that can then lead to the ozone production. So these are the regions that are most impacted, but if ozone produced that ground level gets higher up into the atmosphere,

34:37it has a longer lifetime, it can be transported over hundreds, thousands of kilometers. And then if under the right weather conditions that comes back to the surface, it can also provide ozone pollution relatively remote places as well far from the emission source. Are levels spiking and how do wildfires come into all of this? It's very challenging to get a clear picture on how ozone in the low atmosphere is changing. We know in terms of the precursor emissions that there is mitigation and strategies around the world policy to reduce those emissions, and indeed we're seeing it certainly in Europe and North America, other parts of the world decreases in the amounts of nitrogen oxides which are emitted, but there's also a natural contribution which also plays a role. So really targeting ozone is very challenging. And in terms of wildfires, so burning vegetation is also a source of nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds. And so under the right conditions chemical reactions in the smoke plume can also lead to ozone pollution as well.

35:38Mark Parington with the Copernicus atmosphere monitoring service. Well, a ceremonial groundbreaking ceremony has taken place today on a new $16 billion oil refinery at the Canyon Port of Lammu. It's being developed by the Nigerian billionaire Alica Dengote and his Dengoti group. When it's complete, Kenya says the new refinery will reduce dependency on imported refined fuels and potentially allow Kenya to export refined products. But there been protests against the product and a Canyon court has put a halt to major construction of the refinery until another hearing happens in two weeks time. Lammu is a world heritage site and some have concerns about the environmental impact of the refinery. Well, lead Ali is co-founder of the community-based organization, Save Lammu. Very much concern that will be an environmental impact. We are expecting the air pollution. So the air is a mitigation. So we are very much worried of this project. If there is no proper engagement with the community, this will be

36:45disastrous. Our population is 150,000. They were going to create a 60,000 joke. So we are very scaring of deploying the people from outside, coming down with the experience. The BBC's Wahegamwara spoke to Africa's richest man, the developer Alica Dengoti, ahead of today's groundbreaking ceremony and asked him if he was concerned about the protests. Was there any issue about land before? So we know these games. You know, these games have been played by both local marketers and international traders. You think that people directly look into sabotage? No, nobody. Nobody. Nobody. Nobody. Nobody wants Africa to develop. That's why we Africans will develop Africa. Whether they like it or they don't like it, we are moving. It's a moving trade. Either you join it or you be crushed a long way. We don't have a problem with that. Why should these Africans? What should they believe about what this refinery will lead for them? Because in Lagos, and you can call me

37:49if I'm wrong, there was an expectation that fewer prices would come down once your refinery was fully operational. That hasn't happened. In fact, fewer prices have gone up. What's in it for the Africans when this refinery is up and running? It is not true. When you check the prices of petroleum products in Nigeria, they actually the cheapest compared to all even our neighbors by 20%. But the issue today, price, you cannot change. Because we buy crude based on the traded market. We also sell products based on the traded market. But there are lots of other expenses that were actually caught down to make sure that yes, we accommodate our own markets. What risks do you foresee? Do you believe by 2030, this refinery will be up and running? By 2030, the refinery here will be run by 2030. So to come and see that some people are demonstrating about what?

38:51Have you ever seen people demonstrating against themselves in terms of development? At the height of the construction, you have 60,000 people working there at the refinery. Do you have construction? So are we going to bring robots? Of course, the people will benefit. That was the developer Aliko Dengochi. And returning to our lead story and the dramatic events on the flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv, that was diverted to Saudi Arabia, the Israeli Prime Minister has said one of the pilots was attempting to sabotage the plane. You're listening to NewsHour. Next to Ukraine, where President Zelensky says at least five people have been killed and 14 injured across the country in the latest Russian overnight attacks. Many parts of Ukraine are facing regular bombardment by new Russian jet-powered drones that can evade air defenses. All this week, we're looking at how the war is affecting education across Ukraine, with a daily diary from Lisa Takachenko, a biology teacher in the seaside town of Zatoka

39:57in the country's south. She recorded this for us. Our morning started at 4.30am, four guided aerial bombs hit our town. There was another air alert just before the school day began, but right before we had to move to the school, it ended and because of that, we could make it to the building. But not everyone, because many kids stayed home, simply because they were completely exhausted from the sleepless night. I actually had to spend a good part of my first lesson, just trying to stabilize kids emotionally and physically, before we could even think about lessons and biology. Then, right in the middle of the first lesson, we got another siren. The target wasn't our town this time, but we still had to move the entire school down to the bomb shelter. There were one thing that amazed me today, because even down there, sitting in a

40:58concrete basement, the kids were signing teachers' appreciation cards. They didn't lose their kindness, but we were lucky for the rest of the day we got to stay in the classrooms without any interruptions, and I also had few students joining my lessons online today. Their families have been forced to move to other villages to get through the upcoming winter, which everyone is worried will be incredibly difficult. By midday, children slowly came back to their normal state. They finally woke up, got their energy back, and they engaged with the lesson pretty good. The daily diary from Lisa Takachenko, a biology teacher, reporting from the seaside town of Zatoka in Ukraine. Well, I'm Celia Hatton. Thanks for joining us on NewsHour. Before we go, the Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyaku says one of the pilots has been arrested on that flight that was bound for Tel Aviv,

42:02but landed in Saudi Arabia. Thanks for joining us on NewsHour.