In February 2024, I was invited to speak at a dawah conference in Bosnia – not an unusual event as I spend time travelling for various lectures, events and conferences fairly regularly.

The difference this time was not the conference, which was very productive with wonderful people attending and speaking. The difference was an incredible experience I had whilst travelling.

My flight from London to Vienna had been delayed – only by about fifteen minutes, but with a very short turn around time to get to the connecting flight from Vienna to Sarajevo.  By the time I had crawled through security (a new addition for UK citizens thanks to Brexit), I arrived at the gate exactly three minutes after it had closed. Alhamdulillah. I was not meant to get on that flight.

On going back to the booking desk, the assistant told me I would need to catch the next flight; meaning a nine hour wait in Vienna. Although my heart sank at the prospect, I also knew that there is Allah’s wisdom in all things. So many times in my life I have experienced Allah’s protection from different things and in different situations. Little did I know that this was to be a different experience and a different test.

I might add at this point, I am not the best flier; slightly nervous but over the years I have got used to flying and the fact that when I fly I have no choice to completely surrender my trust to My Lord.  My general habit when I get on a plane is to plug into the Qur’an on my phone; although I admit I wince each time the plane bumps along the waves of air.

As it was such a long wait for the connection, so as I had not visited Vienna before, I decided to jump onto a train to the city and take a look around for a few hours. The first thing was to look for a Masjid to pray in. After aiming (badly) for the main Masjid, but getting on the wrong train and ending up on the outskirts of the city, I was directed by some helpful brothers (through google translate) to a small local Masjid which turned out to be run by the Turkish community. I feared on my way that the sisters section may be closed; particularly as it was in the middle of the afternoon… not salah time. As I walked the mile to find the Masjid, I planned in my head to maybe pray in the car park if it was closed.

Walking briskly ahead of me was a sister; but as I got closer to what I presumed was the Masjid it seemed she was going in the same direction and I felt a compulsion to follow her. Indeed, she turned into the carpark and I quickened my pace to catch up with her, indicating that I needed to pray. SubhanAllah – she took out some keys from her pocket and unlocked the sisters door for me. May Allah swt reward her – she was a gift from Allah to enable me to pray in such a peaceful Masjid (please make dua for this sister).

Once I was back on my connection plane to Sarajevo, from take-off I felt funny; a bit tense and strange. Something felt wrong. The flight was only to be for one hour, so I settled down and dismissed my concern as paranoia and exhaustion as I had now been travelling non-stop for sixteen hours.

What happened next, would test my emaan in ways I could not imagine.

As we approached Sarajevo, the cabin lights had been switched off by the crew to prepare for the landing and the fasten seatbelt signs flashed on but apart from the odd reading light, the cabin was in darkness and, as many people were sleeping; almost completely silent.

Then it began. At first, the plane became slightly bumpy – almost like a car popping over a series of small speed bumps. I felt mildly anxious but as I had experienced turbulence like this before I dismissed it. Usually, turbulence lasts only a few seconds or a few minutes, then the plane emerges at the other side into calmer air. But this neither stopped or got less. It steadily increased.

The lower we descended towards the airport, bumps developed into swerves and small dips. I was getting more worried and began to make du’a out loud, but I was still OK but the closer to landing we got, the swerves and dips turned into sharp dives. Wind impacted the shell of the cabin – which now creaked and moaned with the pressure. All of a sudden, the plane dived and lurched off to one side as if being ripped out of the sky by invisible hands. The wings shivered and shook as if they would be ripped away. Engines roared as the pilot accelerated sharply back into the sky and we went from descending to a sharp ascension that forced passengers heads onto their seat backs.

My anxiety progressed quickly to terror – not the type of fear that we feel when we meet an angry dog or have a close call with a car. This was a new fear level for me. A fear that actually we might not make it. A fear of the reality of end of life; a violent crash, a ball of fire and crashing dive from the sky to the ground. Fear that my sins were simply too big and too many. Fear that I had not done enough with my time on this dunya.

My body began to shake violently, and an uncontrollable cold sweat started. My heart felt like it would break out of my chest as my body struggled to come to terms with the fight for survival it faced.

I had always wondered how I would react in this type of situation. I realise now that the human reaction isn’t something that we can predict or practice. Physical senses and responses to the danger threatened to completely take over my whole being. Yet throughout, I had been either reciting dua or clinging on to the comforting sound of the Qur’an.

The silence of the sleeping cabin was now pierced by the sound of raw human fear. People cried. People screamed. Children were crying. Several people got out of their seats; looking for a way to escape this unbearable fear. I am sure that other people were praying too. The captain announced in a shaky voice that he had to abort the first landing attempt due to the plane being trapped in a wind tube but that he would try again. Every fibre in me wanted it to just stop but it continued on and on. My body was so full of terror and to offload the burden that I vomited uncontrollably.

In the midst of the chaos, I urgently needed to be on my own with Allah (swt) to find Sakinah and accept my potential fate. I jammed in my earphones and pressed the phone volume up to full to fill my senses with Allah’s words. If I was indeed to return to My Lord, I wanted His words to be the final sound of my time in His dunya. My body then curled itself into the fetal position to stay close to the only comfort I had left.  

The plane had circled for another attempt at landing; back through the wind tunnel.

It was then that the du’a came.  

Not the type of du’a that we make at normal times, or even the type of dua I had been making up until this point. A level of du’a was granted to my heart that I have never been able to make in my life before; even when I was on Jabal Rahmah (The Mountain of Mercy) during Hajj back in 2005. It was as if my heart became part of my tongue and my tongue part of my heart. I begged Allah to forgive me. To wipe away my sins. To help me get through this with emaan and taqwa. And pleading in His names – If He was to take me in these moments, to take my soul back; to love me and be pleased.

In that instant, when I was desperate for something. Any sign. My Creator made me remember an  example of His intervention from the Qur’an. A story that I had been teaching about just the week before. An example given in the Qur’an of the Mother of Musa (as) who, when her heart became empty due to sorrow and terror for her baby the Prophet Musa (as) and she could not focus on anything else to the point that she nearly revealed what had happened even though the consequences of that would have been a disaster.

Not a single person can claim that Ummu Musa was not a pious and strong character. Allah swt had chosen her to be the mother of a Prophet and she was the wife of a Prophet. But Fear makes us irrational and confused, and our hearts can become fu’aad (engulfed with emotion). The shaytaan tries to intervene in these moments, and the nafs become full of fear that can overcome the heart’s strength and emaan.

So I made a further dua: Ya Rab, please, strengthen my heart. Strengthen it like you strengthened the heart of Ummu Musa (as). I knew that without this help, I was at risk of failing this test.

As soon as I had made this du’a, although nothing had changed and the plane was still being tossed around like a toy, as we entered that wind tunnel once more, I felt a change deep within my heart. Allah had poured acceptance and sakinah deep into it. I was ready. I was ready for whatever was going to happen life or death. I remained in the same fetal position and continued with du’a and invited the Qur’anic verses to flood my senses completely where I was engulfed in a world of Sakinah. I could have been the only one on that plane. Nothing else mattered. Nobody else was there. Just me and Allah.

I don’t really know how long it took, but the next thing I realized, we had landed safely. People were crying and applauding with relief. My body had drained of all energy and I cried with thanks to Allah.  Shortly after, the brothers who collected me from the airport, when told about what had happened said the most incredible thing that will stick in my head for the rest of my life:

أعطاك الله حياة جديدة

Allah gave you a new life.

Alhamdulillah, the conference in Bosnia was a success and I hope that it will lead to some positive developments of the dawah work in Europe. 

On the two flights back to the UK, I sat and reflected. I had decided to revise Surah Al Mulk on the way home, so plugged myself in once more. Each time we descended towards an airport, and my anxiety returned just a little bit. I glanced at the verses on the phone that I had been revising, and realised both times that the verse Allah swt had chosen for me to descend to was meant to comfort me and make me think:

أَوَلَمۡ يَرَوۡاْ إِلَى ٱلطَّيۡرِ فَوۡقَهُمۡ صَـٰٓفَّـٰتٖ وَيَقۡبِضۡنَۚ مَا يُمۡسِكُهُنَّ إِلَّا ٱلرَّحۡمَٰنُۚ إِنَّهُۥ بِكُلِّ شَيۡءِۭ بَصِيرٌ

 Do they not see the birds above them spreading and closing their wings? It is only the Lord of Mercy who holds them up: He watches over everything.’ Surah 67: Verse 19.

I am so grateful that Allah (swt) has given me this experience, and also that He had added comfort to the return flights from His own words – and most of all I am grateful that I remain on this dunya to do His work for some more time as He sees fit.

Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Aalameen.