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Itinerary
Mumbai (BOM) - Istanbul (IST) TK 721
Airbus A330, TC-LOC
Departs BOM: 07:00
Arrives IST: 11:45 Seat: 32D
Istanbul (IST) - Belgrade (BEG) TK 1079
Airbus A321, TC-JRN
Departs IST: 14:35
Arrives BEG: 14:25 Seat: 4F
It took me some time to fully process this trip, but given the nature of this website, I feel like it would be a worthwhile addition.
On the evening of Friday February 27th, my boss and I were talking about the state of the world during our debrief of our business trip to Mumbai. She commented on how she’s happy about Lufthansa and Air India taking precautions in avoiding Iranian airspace, and that was quite surprised that my Turkish Airlines flight crossed both Iranian and Pakistani airspace on February 23th/24th. I shrugged, knowing that TK probably did its due diligence before choosing a flight path. At this point, Pakistan and Afghanistan had opened fire on each other again, but checking on flightradar, I still saw TK flights taking their usual paths.
My boss left in the evening for Munich, and I said goodbye at the airport. I chose TK when booking this trip, because my Belgrade base meant that Istanbul would be the best hub to connect. And the trip to Mumbai was great, BEG to BOM in less than ten hours via IST, and we even landed 45 minutes early, presumably because we flew over empty Iranian airspace.
The next morning, February 28th, 2026, I arrived at BOM airport as an unsuspecting passenger. I like the new terminal, and I like that my ex’s MasterCard now works in lounges all over the world. So, I grabbed something that could be called breakfast at five in the morning and waited for my flight to board. On my way to the gate, I overheard a Turkish woman giving very firm orders to the people around her, only to lift my head and realise that that woman is going to be our pilot today, with three young male co-pilots by her side.
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| Our plane, TC-LOC at Mumbai Airport |
We boarded the flight, and I set up at my seat. The flight had a near perfect load factor, as I kindly asked the staff if there were any two free seats next to each other. The flight to BOM had such a low load factor, I’d be surprised if it was even 30%. Looking at the moving map, I saw the path is to go over Pakistan and Iran. Again, I assumed the best.
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| Flight path as shown pre-flight |
A while into the flight, I noticed that we were flying over Pakistan, despite the ongoing conflict, but noticed that we were flying over the south of the country, so I didn’t think much of it. As we crossed into Iran, I was fast asleep and just woke up in time to snap a photo of our plane being positioned over Tehran. Nothing to worry about, but my boss would probably think it’s crazy that TK chose that route.
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Shortly after, the crew went through and asked people to put their window blinds down. I wouldn’t have noticed anything being off, if it wasn’t for one crew member asking the other “Why are we putting the blinds down?“, “The passengers need to sleep!“. I don’t know if it was my limited understanding of Turkish, or if the conversation sounded wrong, but soon after I would follow their command and dose off for a second.
We were now over Tabriz, headed over to Azerbaijan, which was odd to me. And then I noticed something. My seat neighbor, an Indian woman with limited knowledge of English, was watching the CNN live broadcast of the bombing of Tehran. Though at first, I thought she was watching an action film where Iran is being bombed by Israel and the US. Then I realised it was a news broadcast but thought that maybe it was old. But why would it say “Saturday morning“, and why did the GMT time match the actual GMT time.
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| Live news broadcast available during the entire flight |
At that point, we were heading out of the airspace of a country that is actively being bombed. There were no announcements made by the pilot, some passengers were sleeping, some were oblivious to what was going on, and others, I’m assuming, were, just like myself, going through the anguish of realising what is happening, how powerless we are, and that we better cross into Azerbaijani airspace as soon as possible. Which we did.
The rest of the flight was relatively uneventful. I realised that the blinds were put down to avoid panic in the cabin. The little pop kek they offered was to keep us busy, and probably to check in on us. And the silence on the way to Istanbul was deafening. I have never been on a plane this silent, and I don’t think I can properly put into words what it’s like.
The first emotion upon landing in Istanbul and getting out of the plane was joy. I made my way to the lounge, informed people I was okay, even recorded a silly video of myself, making a joke. I made my way to the TK international lounge, as my flight to BEG was in business (a 100 euro deal I couldn’t say no to), and was a bit underwhelmed by how full the lounge was, to the point that it wasn’t as special as people have hyped it up to be. Though I must say, they have very nice shower rooms that were a godsend after the initial shock of the flight.
After landing in Belgrade (the second flight was pretty uneventful, and the on-board catering has gotten noticeably worse on TK), I overheard a fellow passenger speaking on the phone about our flight to Istanbul. I asked him about his experience on board, and he was one of the lucky ones that slept through the entire section over Iran and woke up over the Caucasus.
Researching flightradar data and news reports, with the times and position of our aircraft, it seems like we were anywhere between two and fifteen minutes away from the missiles, and I like to believe that our stern pilot, did the best she could to keep us safe at all times.
The day of arrival, nobody came to meet me at Belgrade airport, and I tried to carry on normally, because the flight did feel normal. But shock is a tricky symptom, it took me two full days to realise what had happened. On Monday I called in sick. My boss quietly struck TK off of the list of airlines we fly with.
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Wow
ReplyDeleteGreat report. Gald you made it all ok!
ReplyDeleteWoman pilot? I work for TK. We have no female A330 captains.
ReplyDeleteWent same flight last year. Was buffled why on way there flight path was over Iran and way back it was over Arabia sea and over Gulf.
ReplyDeleteDuring way there, it was redeye flight, so we could see Tehran lights. City is huge. Couldnt belive its that large.
Not just Tehran. Many beautifully illuminated cities over Iran at night.
DeleteEspecially Esfahan.
DeleteFew realize Iran is actually quite a developed country.
@12:22 Tehran is almost 10m. Vast indeed
DeleteOther cities were also big, but not that huge and bright. Other were just as any regular city in Europe or Asia.
DeleteOther cities were also big, but not that huge and bright. Other were just as any regular city in Europe or Asia.
DeleteWell, you didn't fly over all of them. Esfahan agglomeration is also enormous, like 3 million people or something.
DeleteWell, this flight took place first day of the war. I wander how other airlines flew over from DXB, DOH or AUH? They fly out from those airports at this moment while we are typing these messages, in war zone, and nobody comments on that..
ReplyDelete“The rest of the flight was relatively uneventful.” gets a completely new meaning after that experience. Great trip report !
ReplyDelete