the truth about people who fell from an American plane at Kabul airport

It’s a scene that has come to symbolize the chaotic end of America’s 20-year war in Afghanistan: a US Air Force heavy cargo plane takes off from Kabul airport, hunted down by hundreds of desperate Afghans rushing to get on the plane.

As the C-17 transporter takes to the skies, a cellphone video capture two small dots falling from the plane. The footage from another angle shows many of those on the track stopping in their tracks and pointing their fingers.

The magnitude of the horror only becomes apparent later. It appears that the points were desperate afghans hiding in the wheel arch. When the wheels were folded back into the body of the plane, the stowaways had to choose between being crushed to death or letting go and rushing to the ground.

More than a month later, we still don’t know what happened during this tragic takeoff on August 16, the day after the Taliban entered Kabul, causing an avalanche of Afghans trying to flee the country.

We don’t even know how many died. The videos show two dots falling from the plane in flight, several seconds apart. But two bodies landed on the same roof at the same time, suggesting they fell together, so the other character we see falling in the videos could be, at least, another person.

In addition, the US military said it found human remains in the wheel well of the C-17 when it landed in Qatar, but did not specify the number of people. At least one person, a young footballer, died on the runway, crushed under the wheels of the C-17.

To take off

The US military said it had not completed its investigation into what happened that day. According to the military, the C-17 was carrying supplies for the evacuation to the airport, but he was assaulted by Afghans on the runway when he landed.

Fearing that the plane would overflow, the crew decided to take off again without lowering the load. Videos taken by Afghans on the runway show hundreds of people running past the plane, and possibly a dozen sitting in the wheel arch, though it is not known how many jumped before the take off of the plane.

One of those in the wheel arch was Fida Mohammad, dentist, 24 years old.

Before, he was hopeful, his family said. He was married last year in an extravagant ceremony that cost his family $ 13,000. Your dream of opening a dental clinic in Kabul, it had come true.

So the Taliban took Kabul, and all possibilities of his future seemed to disappearher father Painda Mohammed told The Associated Press.

The old man still has trouble understanding what his son was thinking when he got behind the wheel. He’s haunted by guilt, fearing that Fida would take such a risk because she wanted to help pay off the big loan her father had taken out for the marriage.

Head in hands, Painda says that you spend hours imagining your child’s last minutes, the fear he must have felt as the ground beneath him began to disappear and the wheels spun inward, knowing he had no choice but to let go.

Ashore, Abdullah Waiz was sleeping at his home at the time and was woken up by a loud noise. His first thought was an explosion. He ran out of the house. His neighbors showed the roof of his house and They told him about the bodies that fell from the sky.

Two bodies fell on the same corner of its roof, Waiz said, pointing to where the concrete was still stained with blood. Waiz thinks they were holding hands because they fell in the same spot. Picked up the leftovers on a rag and took them to a nearby mosque, he said.

“For 48 hours after that, I couldn’t sleep or eat,” he said.

They identified one of the bodies as being Fida because they found her father’s name and number in her pocket. Local media said the second body had been identified as a young man named Safiullah Hotak.

Chaos

For two weeks in late August, when the United States and its allies ended their presence in Afghanistan, tens of thousands of Afghans flocked to Kabul airport, frantic to escape an Afghanistan led by the Taliban.

A 2 year old boy was killed in the stampede. An Islamic State suicide bomber blew himself up in the crowd, killing 169 Afghans and 13 US servicemen. However, even after the explosion, thousands of people returned to the airport, hoping to get in.

The scenes were so traumatic that the US Air Force offered psychological counseling forces personnel working at Kabul airport, as well as the crew of the ill-fated C-17 flight after it landed at Al-Udeid Air Base in Qatar.

Another victim on August 16 was Zaki Anwari, 17, a rising star of the Afghan national football team. He would spend hours watching his hero Lionel Messi play. “He didn’t get tired. It was the only thing he talked about, the only thing he did,” said his 20-year-old brother, Zakir Anwari.

Zaki was too young to know about the harsh Taliban regime of the late 1990s. But when the militant force swept through the provinces, Zaki’s social media were inundated with rumors and horror stories which claimed to tell the story of life under the reign of the Taliban.

During their last reign, the Taliban banned most sports, including football, and regularly detained young people at prayer times to force them to attend the mosque. Zaki was sure that his dream of competing internationally in the Afghan team, it was over.

Zaki traveled to the airport with an older brother and a cousin on August 16. He only had to watch the car while his cousin, who worked for an American company, tried to enter the airport. Instead, while they were gone, climbed the airport separation wall.

A breathless Zaki then called his other brother Zakir. He told her that he was inside the airport and that he would be boarding a plane soon. Zakir said he begged his brother not to leave, reminding him that he didn’t have his passport, not even his ID, and asking him: “What are you going to do in the United States?

But her younger brother hung up and then called her mother. “Pray for me. I am going to America,” Zaki said. She begged him: “Go back home”.

Zaki was no longer listening. He ran alongside the plane as it picked up speed until suddenly he was hit from the side, fell under the wheel and diedwitnesses later told the family.

Painda Mohammad, the father of the young dentist, watches the videos repeatedly on his phone in which her son appears dancing at his wedding.

Through tears she said, “It was a gift from God and now God has taken it away.”

AP Agency

PB