Pilot was Vladimir Vodopivec (64) from Belgrade, Serbia.
Edited Google translation from very early Serbian media news, here:
EKSKLUZIVNO Srpski pilot spasao putnike posle eksplozije u avionu
EXCLUSIVE Serbian pilot rescued passengers on the plane after the explosion.
Pilot Vladimir Vodopivec (64) from Belgrade has managed this morning to safely lanad the plane with 74 passengers and crew at the airport in Mogadishu in Somalia after an explosion blew off part of the fuselage near the right wing of the aircraft, 'Blic' learns. International media assess that the pilot "did impossible work", because the incident passed without casualties.
- Half an hour after we took off from the airport in Somalia, at 3,300 meters high there was a terrible explosion. Passengers began to cry, and I immediately went back to the airport. Fortunately, no one was seriously injured - says Vladimir Vodopivec.
...
Experienced pilot had similar thoughts.
- I think it was a bomb, but fortunately it did not damage the control system, so I was able to come back and I land at the airport. This had never happened to me. We lost cabin pressure. Thank God everything ended well - said Vodopivec immediately after the incident to his friend.
Vodopivec, born in Belgrade, is an experienced pilot who worked in Yugoslavian and than Serbian JAT, then in "Montenegro Airlines", and in recent years in Africa, as employed in the "Dalo Airlines". Soon, says his friend, he would retire.
