Vince McMahon Vs. A Crown Prince: WWE's Infamous Saudi Arabia Flight Delay

From the very moment WWE announced a long-term partnership with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to stage two pay-per-views per year in the Middle East, there has been no shortage of questions, gripes, and controversies from fans and critics alike.

A number of years into the deal, there remains plenty of unease about the partnership, especially with the likes of the Royal Rumble and WrestleMania now scheduled to take place in Saudi Arabia as WWE scoops up massive amounts of money from the country’s General Entertainment Authority, and Triple H calls a man who allegedly has his own prison wing a “friend.” 

The 2019 Crown Jewel has been the source of one of pro wrestling's most unusual controversies, as well as one of its most troubling. Contributing to the troubling nature is the fact that so much about the affair - save for a few enticing tidbits - is unknown, mired in contradictions, and largely muffled in silence. The incident remains one of pro wrestling's most fascinating, mysterious and disturbing sagas in history.

WWE and Saudi Arabia Begin Working Together

In 2018, WWE announced a decade-long partnership with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, as part of the country's Saudi Vision 2030 promotional campaign. As part of the deal, WWE would hold bi-annual pay-per-view events in the country worth in the region of $55 million per event. 

The initial announcement led to immediate criticism with regards to KSA's human rights record, their exclusion of female performers (later amended with concessions concerning attire), and the fact that the whole thing felt like an elaborate sportswashing scheme. 

There were also controversies during the early course of the partnership - not least of all, running the 2018 Crown Jewel event shortly after the assassination of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Despite an audience outcry, as well as urging from American politicians, and several major stars pulling out of Crown Jewel due to the backlash, WWE chose to run the event anyway.

There was also the jarring propaganda video that aired during the inaugural event, Greatest Royal Rumble. The early cards were panned too for their substandard quality with matches like D-Generation X vs. The Brothers of Destruction, Shane McMahon's World Cup win, and The Undertaker vs. Goldberg making the Saudi shows come across as glorified live events booked for the amusement of one, in this case the Saudi Crown Prince as opposed to Vince McMahon. 

Crown Jewel 2019

This all occurred before Crown Jewel 2019. In the month prior to the event, WWE had Brock Lesnar squash reigning WWE champion Kofi Kingston in under 10 seconds on the SmackDown premiere on FOX. Days later, WWE produced the infamous Seth Rollins vs. The Fiend Hell in a Cell match that ended in a match stoppage after Rollins hit Bray Wyatt with a giant clown hammer.

This was also all happening amidst the launch of All Elite Wrestling, with the first episode of Dynamite airing on TNT on October 3, as a genuine alternative to WWE outside of the company emerged for the first time since the shuttering of World Championship Wresting in 2001. 

On the day of Halloween, a mere 25 days after the Hell in a Cell fiasco, WWE staged Crown Jewel at King Fahd International Stadium in Riyadh. Like the Saudi pay-per-views preceding it, the match card boasted a mix of canonical rivalries and convoluted one-offs.

In addition to a rematch between Seth Rollins and The Fiend over the Universal Title, Brock Lesnar defended the WWE Title against former UFC opponent Cain Velasquez, Braun Strowman faced boxer Tyson Fury, and Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair cobbled together five-man teams to face each other just weeks before Survivor Series.

In one notable moment, though, Natalya vs. Lacey Evans became the first women’s pro wrestling match to ever take place in Saudi Arabia, although a dress code was enforced. 

The show was another absolute clunker, if not quite as atrocious as Crown Jewel 2018 or Super ShowDown 2019. Tyson Fury vs. Braun Strowman and Brock Lesnar vs. Cain Velasquez were just plain bad pro wrestling matches. Natalya vs. Lacey Evans was a nothing match outside of the historical opponents, and Seth Rollins vs. The Fiend was only marginally better than their Hell in a Cell match just weeks earlier. On a show with so many so-called stars, the best match was likely Mansoor defeating Cesaro. 

So, while Crown Jewel was not a total abomination, it was poor enough that everybody was just happy it was all over.

The WWE Roster Has Trouble Leaving The Tarmac

It was then time for the talent to catch the first flight back to the United States as the SmackDown roster had to be in Buffalo, New York the following day. Things didn’t exactly go to plan. 

Reports indicated that the charter flight to the US was scheduled to take off at 3 am local time, around 8 pm ET. The flight would carry around 175 wrestlers and assorted staff members, while some of the bigger names, including Hulk Hogan, Brock Lesnar, Paul Heyman, Ric Flair, Vince McMahon, and others had left on private jets.

The charter flight operated by Atlas Air was quickly delayed, however. The problems began with smaller, incremental delays of 10 minutes to 30 minutes, which built to around six hours, with one wrestler being told there would be a one-hour delay due to needing to refuel the plane.

David Bixenspan of Babyface vs. Heel quoted the wrestler as saying: "Why should we need to refuel the plane NOW when it’s been sitting in the exact same position it was when it dropped us off two days prior? The reason for charters is to get a group of people out on time and have everything ready to go."

Levi Cooper (FKA Tucker In WWE) explained to Cultaholic that the pilot on the plane said they couldn't takeoff as they couldn't secure the necessary paperwork:

"So, we left from the show and we go to the airport. Where we're flying out of is not the main terminal but 'executive arrivals'. It's basically a private hangar for big groups and those on invitation from the government. So we get to that executive arrival building, we're one of the only ones in there at the time. It's probably midnight or so, we left straight after the show so we're tired and hungry too because we ate before the show but catering got put away at 6:30 pm.

"The confusion at the building was crazy because nobody's getting any information about what's happening. We sit there for like four hours probably in executive arrivals. Finally, they let us get on the airplane. We're on the airplane for 90 minutes, maybe 2 hours and we can't take off for whatever reason. The pilot is basically like, 'We can't get our completed paperwork.' However, the air traffic stuff works, the plane's good, the crew's good, we're all good here with Atlas Air, but the issue is we can't get clearance from the airport. They're not allowing us to leave."

During the delay, a number of wrestlers and staffers began texting friends and loved ones back home, as well as journalists. According to Bixenspan's account, one wrestler referred to the situation as a "big sh*t show", adding, "We're all pretty certain we're being held hostage."

Per a number of first-hand accounts, a number of armed military policemen were seen outside the plane during the delay, too. One anonymous wrestler testified in a 2020 shareholders civil suit filed against WWE, claiming he saw, "A 'ton' of guards wearing black 'militia' attire and wearing guns that were blocking their exit and 'staring at the wrestlers.'"

That wrestler added that when the pilot announced that they couldn't take off, he sounded "distressed."

Regarding the earlier refuelling explanation, Bixenspan's source claimed that the technician in charge of fuelling was not available, only for them to be told minutes later that it was okay to board.

Mechanical Issues?

Eventually, WWE in a press statement claimed that mechanical issues were the culprit of the delay, writing in part: "The WWE roster is delayed in its return from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, following a historic performance at yesterday’s record-breaking WWE Crown Jewel event. More than 175 Superstars, production crew and employees boarded a 747 charter flight back to the United States on Thursday. After the door closed, due to several aircraft problems including mechanical issues, all passengers sat on the tarmac for more than six hours."

A number of wrestlers doubted this account, according to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, and they believed it was simply a cover story invented by WWE.

WWE’s statement also contradicted a statement allegedly made by then-Senior Director of Talent Relations Mark Carrano, with the wrestler who spoke on the record in the 2020 civil suit claiming that Carrano said the delay stemmed from a dispute between Vince McMahon and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman earlier that day. 

The live broadcast of Crown Jewel aired on a 40-minute delay in Saudi Arabia, reportedly at McMahon's behest as WWE were allegedly still owed substantial amounts of money from the Kingdom for prior events, and the WWE boss apparently chose to take that stand as a means of getting their attention.

According to Levi Cooper, one of WWE's cameramen who wore a headset and could hear all the production chatter, heard "the main man" order the Saudi feed to be cut.

"A lot of what was read is fairly accurate, I don't know for sure. What I heard, and I heard this from a cameraman who obviously is wearing the headset and can hear all the chatter over the headset, the main man told him to cut the feed to the Saudis. That's what I heard. I don't know if that's true or not, that's just what the rumour I heard and I also read that on the internet a couple of times as well. I don't have any confirmation of that but that's sort of the reason I heard was based around money. And that we [WWE] hadn't been paid and there was some kind of disagreement. And so the feed for that particular show was cut to the Saudis. This is just the speculation that I heard but I did hear it in Saudi Arabia from somebody on a camera. It is hearsay, but that is the best I can do," Tucker said.

"So we sort of got into a billionaire d*ck measuring contest. A little bit of a p*ssing match. We're political pawns a little because we were supposed to fly straight back to SmackDown and my wife was very upset, of course. In my mind, at the time I was thinking, 'Well if this situation is sort of what we think it is, they're not gonna keep us long enough to make it in an international thing.' I don't think they're stupid enough to be like, 'Hey we really want to catch some heat over this. But if we can maybe inconvenience them for inconveniencing us and make their guys miss SmackDown, then we'll inconvenience them.'"

Former WWE Spanish language announcer Hugo Savinovich claimed that two sources within the company told him (among other things) that the order went from McMahon to Kevin Dunn. As this information circulated among the stranded personnel, many came to the conclusion that their delay was retaliation from Saudi Arabia for Vince cutting the broadcast feed.

Talent Get Off The Plane

After those six excruciating hours spent on the plane, the wrestlers were ordered off, due to what they were told was the pilots "timing out." By this point, the word was out that the flight wasn't making it back to the States on schedule, and wrestlers expressed their unhappiness at the situation, with Buddy Matthews vaguely tweeting "Never again" in the midst of the standstill, while Rusev asked for “all the prayers” and Andrade called it a “bad day in Saudi Arabia.” 

Numerous outlets discussed how many of the wrestlers were upset at Vince for flying out as early as he did, believing he had left a big mess in his wake, resulting in the stranded staff having to answer for it. The Observer noted that McMahon's flight left at 12:40 am local time, more than two hours before the charter flight began its boarding process.

Meltzer claimed that several talents told him they were never going back to Saudi Arabia, and that they "couldn't wait" to leave WWE. Meltzer went on to tweet that, according to one stranded individual, WWE were trying to get talents to talk about the alleged "mechanical issues" on video, in order to corroborate their stated cause of delay.

For WWE's part, they continued to deny all claims that there was anything besides mechanical issues delaying the charter flight. Additionally, it was not 100 percent clear that McMahon - by flying out when he did - knew there was going to be a serious issue.

Alternative Plans Are Made

In the interim, the stuck wrestlers and staff were booked into hotel rooms where they could at least get some semblance of rest.

It was also arranged for a second charter flight to take 20 selected individuals, estimated to be a dozen wrestlers and a handful of support personnel to Buffalo, in the hopes of making it in time for Friday's SmackDown broadcast. They didn't quite make it, so the show was instead populated by Triple H and a number of NXT stars as part of an invasion angle in the build to Survivor Series. 

It should be noted that in WWE's press release, they wrote of the emergency charter: "With SmackDown set to emanate live from Buffalo, N.Y., several Superstars felt so strongly that they arranged for their own separate charter in order to make it back to the U.S. for the show."

It would seem this part was a myth. WWE reportedly paid for the flight themselves, while trumping up the mythos for dramatic effect. Several of those left behind were annoyed by the implication that they didn't "want it enough" to get to SmackDown. Luke Harper and Tyson Kidd were among those who publicly commented on WWE's statement, with Kidd sarcastically writing, "Next time we’ll pool our money together instead of being lazy."

The remaining wrestlers all eventually made it home, but not before experiencing a few more delays with their charter. Levi Copper explained:

"We go into another hotel in Riyadh and we stay there for, I don't know, maybe 10-12 hours. Something like that. Basically book rooms for everybody so we can get some sleep and whatnot and then we head back to the airport the next evening. And everything when we got back was pretty smooth except I remember we get there, we get through executive arrivals. The time before we got straight on the airplane. The other times we'd get straight on the airplane from executive arrivals, but I guess because we stayed for a whole day, I don't know if they moved the plane to mess with us or if they moved it because they had to but in that timeframe, our plane got moved to the main terminal but nobody knew this.

"So when we get through executive arrivals, instead of getting on the plane, we get on trams and we take off. After a couple of minutes, we're in the desert now because, we don't know this, but we're probably a mile and a half from our plane. So we end up on these people movers for 20 minutes before we get to our plane. Five or 10 minutes in, we've all been through this 24-hour ordeal and now we're on these buses. There's dark everywhere, we can see executive arrivals behind us and the main airport over there but around us is nothing and we're all like, 'Feel a little sketchy to you, man? Feels a little sketchy to us. I don't know what's going on here. Where are we going? Where are they taking us?' And ultimately we get back on the plane and end up flying home and landing in JFK and everybody flies home to their respective wherever because we didn't make SmackDown. It was an ordeal. It was enough to make me never want to go back to Saudi Arabia."

The Fallout

The talent eventually arrived back in New York midday on Saturday, a full 24 hours after they were originally supposed to get home. The full day's delay made it hard for many to believe that mechanical issues were to blame.

As Meltzer reasoned: "This is WWE that has 175 people on a show that makes millions and millions of dollars. It's impossible for me to believe that there couldn't be a way to fly commercial, and get the guys on a plane somewhere, to Europe, and get them out, as opposed to waiting a day."

The following Monday at Raw, a talent meeting was held hours before showtime. There, Vince McMahon denied any issues between he and Saudi Arabia, and claimed that he had nothing to do with the broadcast feed being cut or delayed. He opened the floor for questions or comments, but got little to no pushback.

The Observer noted that just before the meeting wrapped, Triple H called out Karl Anderson for remarks he made on Twitter, in which Anderson wondered who the "locker room leader" was going to be on Monday. Anderson didn't speak up too much, while those who did talk didn't have anything negative to say.

Meltzer added: "It was noted that there was a feeling that saying anything negative wouldn’t do anyone any good and nobody spoke up."

Corroborating that sentiment was the anonymous wrestler, who claimed he and another wrestler had gone to talent relations to say they would never go back to Saudi Arabia. He added that other wrestlers tried to do the same, only for WWE to push back and threaten, "the future trajectory of their careers if they did not go."

WWE returned to Saudi Arabia at the end of February 2020 for another maligned Super ShowDown. Thirty wrestlers participated in matches on the card, including Anderson, and prior social media commenters Andrade and Murphy.

As for the aforementioned civil suit, in November 2020, WWE announced through an SEC filing that a $39 million settlement had been reached with the plaintiffs, the Firefighters Pension System of the City of Kansas City. The suit alleged that WWE misled stockholders about its relationship with Saudi leaders, and included the flight delay saga in its suit. The anonymous wrestler came forward with his testimony to aid their case.

WWE did avow that the settlement: "Will not contain any admission of liability or admission as to the validity or truth of any or all allegations or claims by any of the Defendants."

The Legacy Of WWE's Saudi Arabia Flight Delay

Years after its occurrence, WWE's delayed flight incident remains the source of speculation. The exact sequence of events and their underlying causes are not entirely known to the public. From the wrestling side, it seems only Vince McMahon knows for sure what precisely transpired. It's possible that he'll be the only one that ever knows for sure.

Since that day, life has went on. WWE have continued their routine stops in Saudi Arabia, with the events earning less and less criticism than they did earlier on. The flight delay story occasionally surfaces in moral arguments, but has mostly been relegated to the dustheap of wrestling history as just "something that happened once." A lot of noise about a veritable international incident was made when it happened, but not so much with the passage of time.

Nonetheless, it remains among the most tantalising stories in pro wrestling lore - the time almost 200 wrestlers and staffers were stranded halfway around the world, the stated cause of which is greatly disputed, and where the exact truth lies remains a mystery.