In October 2017, an unexpected announcement was made that Malaysia Airlines CEO Peter Bellew will return to Ryanair as Chief Operations Officer to help fix pilot problems. Bellew worked as a flight operations director at Ryanair until 2014. Bellew's decision to leave Malaysia Airlines comes just over a year after former chief executive Christoph Mueller left the airline citing personal circumstances a year after being hired on a three-year mission to revive the state-controlled firm. The appointment of Mueller's replacement, Capt Izham Ismail, who served as the airline's chief operating officer prior to the appointment, was announced a few days later.