A Jeddah-bound Saudi Arabian Airlines flight with 182 passengers on board aborted takeoff at India’s Chennai airport on Monday after the pilot detected smoke coming from one of its engines.
Three Saudi men who allegedly opened fire on a senior Riyadh-based journalist and his friend are still at large. Riyadh police have detained several suspects for identification since the attack on Wednesday night on Subhi Rakha, a correspondent for the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Rai. “Many suspects were released after the two police lineups in which we were called to identify the culprits,” Rakha said on Saturday. He said three men “fired indiscriminately from their pistols after my friend and I intervened to settle a scuffle between the Saudi men and an Egyptian national.”
After a hiatus of more than 20 years, Saudi Arabia will restore aviation links with Iraq with the launch of the first flight from Jeddah to Baghdad by the Kingdom’s privately owned Alwafeer Air on Thursday.
The body of a man was found in the landing gear of a Nas Air plane that flew from Beirut and landed at Riyadh’s King Khaled International Airport (KKIA) early Saturday with 130 people on board.
Hanadi Zakaria Al-Hindi will undergo a nephrectomy procedure at King Faisal Hospital in Jeddah on July 20. “The nephrectomy will finally decide my fate, either to allow me to work as a pilot in the cockpit or as a flying instructor on the ground,” Al-Hindi told Arab News, thanking well wishers for their support.
The Saudi Press Agency reported that a plan to implement a multibillion-riyal refinery project in Jazan has also been finalized with the aim of boosting the local economy. The government would also fund the construction of basic educational and health infrastructure at five different locations in southern Jazan, an area that witnessed large-scale evacuations during the clashes.