the captain was 37-year-old aristos sokratous, from cyprus. he had over 6,000 hours of total flying time, including 4,905 hours on the boeing 737. sokratous was promoted to captain a year and a half before the crash. at the time of the crash, he had intended to quit the airline after accepting a job from ryanair, which would allow him to be based with his family in cyprus. his wife was due to give birth to their first child a few weeks after the crash. according to several flydubai staff members, sokratous decided to leave the airline mainly because of fatigue and lifestyle issues.