What is the ruling on praying on an airplane?
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
The questioner asks: Is it permissible to pray in a direction other than the qiblah if you are traveling on an airplane?
Answer:
Voluntary prayer is permissible in a direction other than the qiblah while traveling, and you may pray the voluntary night prayer wherever you are facing, just as the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) did on his journeys. He would pray the tahajjud wherever his mount faced him (peace and blessings be upon him). As for the obligatory prayer, one must face the qiblah, because facing the qiblah is a condition for the validity of the obligatory prayer for one who is able to do so. As for the one who is unable to face the qiblah, he prays according to his situation, to the best of his ability. Yes.
The questioner asks: Is it permissible to pray in a direction other than the qiblah if you are traveling on an airplane?
Answer:
Voluntary prayer is permissible in a direction other than the qiblah while traveling, and you may pray the voluntary night prayer wherever you are facing, just as the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) did on his journeys. He would pray the tahajjud wherever his mount faced him (peace and blessings be upon him). As for the obligatory prayer, one must face the qiblah, because facing the qiblah is a condition for the validity of the obligatory prayer for one who is able to do so. As for the one who is unable to face the qiblah, he prays according to his situation, to the best of his ability. Yes.
Source
قناة «العلامة الدكتور صالح الفوزان»، ما حكم الصلاة في الطائرة؟ — youtube.com
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.