Stephanie Baker had been celebrating her birthday with friends at a bar on Palm Jumeirah – Dubai’s iconic man-made palm-shaped island lined with luxury hotels and beach clubs.
But as the group stepped outside to head to another nearby venue, something unusual streaked across the night sky.
Moments later, debris from a drone struck the five-star Fairmont hotel – Baker and her friends were standing right across the street.
“We all were scared,” she says. “To see something like that was unexpected.”
Baker, a British real estate consultant who moved to the city a year ago, says she always viewed Dubai as one of the safest places in the region.
Yet after two weeks of missile and drone attacks linked to the Iran conflict, she says she has no plans to leave.
“If anything, the way the situation has been handled makes me feel more secure,” she says.
