Passengers on board Malaysian Airlines flight MH128 from Melbourne to Kuala Lumpur have spoken of their confusion when their plane sat on the tarmac for more than an hour with a potential bomb threat on the plane.
After returning to Melbourne Airport, passengers were told there would be a 10-minute wait for police to arrive, but that turned into an hour-and-a-half ordeal as passengers feared for their safety.
"If there had been a bomb on that plane, we should have been evacuated from it, instead we sat there for another hour-and-a-half," one distressed male passenger said.
Another passenger, Robert MacDonald, told reporters the pilot said police would be on the plane in 10 minutes, but an hour later police had not arrived.
"So we were sitting and this guy is pinned down there, and a potential bomb on board and we sat there for an hour and 10 minutes - ridiculous," Mr MacDonald said.
"The police took an hour to go on the plane because they weren't sure whether the bomb was live or not live - it's not very good."
One female passenger told ABC News she thought the whole thing was "disappointing".
“We weren't told, we weren't updated all the time, we could see them [special operations police] all outside but they weren’t coming onto the plane and nobody knew why,” she said.
The plane had been sitting on the tarmac for 40 minutes when one of the passenger's girlfriends called Melbourne radio station 3AW in distress.
“They're on the ground, they can see the police, but there’s no people coming in to get them, so they are all freaking out on this plane,” the caller named Vanessa told 3AW.
“These guys just want to get off this plane because they’re scared that this guy could blow up this plane and this guy looks very suspicious... I don’t know why it’s taken so long.”
The plane had barely left Melbourne on it’s way to Kuala Lumpur when a man allegedly tried to break into the cockpit.
Passenger and former Melbourne Football Club player, Andrew Leoncelli, was sitting nearby and witnessed the incident.
"Very early into the flight, about 10 minutes after take-off, so we're on a steep ascent, the two hostesses just immediately in front of me started, or got engaged, in an argument with somebody I couldn't see hiding behind the service area,” he told reporters at the airport.
“And that conversation got heated to the point where one of the hostesses called out for assistance, you know, I've never heard that before.
“So I got out of my seat, undid my belt and went to the front of the plane and encountered a guy holding a big, black object with a beanie on."
Mr Leoncelli said the man was shouting: "I'm going to blow the plane up".
The 25-year-old man, now identified as a Sri Lankan national, was grabbed and forced to the ground by passengers.
Police confirmed they believe the Australian citizen from Dandenong, in Melbourne's south-east, has a history of mental illness.
“It was a very scary thing, but I don't think that he genuinely had the capacity to hurt anybody on the plane,” Mr Leoncelli said.
The 25-year-old alleged offender is expected to face Melbourne Magistrates' Court on Thursday.
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