Afghanistan: People fall from plane as thousands attempt to flee Kabul at any cost

People scaling airplane ramps and running after planes on the runway: desperate Afghans trying to leave the country in face of Taliban rule filmed videos of the chaos at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul on August 15 and 16, 2021. 

By the evening of August 15, hours after the Taliban surrounded Kabul, dense crowds had already descended upon the airport, as seen in this video posted on Twitter: 

People continued rushing into the airport until the next day. High-resolution satellite images published by Maxar show the extent of the crowds at the airport the next morning.

‘What I saw was a real mess’

Masoud (not his real name) went to the airport with his family the morning of August 16. He told the FRANCE 24 Observers team about the general confusion and chaos that reigned at the airport.

What I saw was a real mess. There were about 10,000 people on the tarmac, and maybe as many as 10,000 others near the airport behind a cordon of Taliban forces who are encircling the airport.

I saw an American military airplane circling for about 30 minutes in the air. It was unable to land because there were people on the tarmac. It’s as if the airport runway was being blocked by a human shield.

People who are there are hoping they can get on an airplane. There were a few civilian flights getting out until Sunday night. Some people were able to get onto those flights by force – maybe five people for each flight. There were maybe 50 flights like this Sunday night. Thousands of people were still there Monday morning, hoping to do the same. I went there with my family hoping to get on a flight, but it was impossible.

‘People are ready to risk their lives to get out of here’

Afghan aviation officials told people on Monday not to come to the airport, but they continued to convene throughout the day. By mid-day, all commercial flights coming from Kabul were cancelled. 

In an act of desperation, people began to climb onto C-17 US military planes that were about to take off. A video shared widely on social media shows a crowd running alongside a plane, while some are seated on the plane’s landing gear flap. 

Another video, filmed from the tarmac just after a US C-17 plane took off, shows two people who had reportedly clung onto the plane, falling hundreds of metres to the ground. 

Due to the shocking nature of this video, we have chosen to only publish screenshots.

Another video from a different angle shows two people falling apparently from the same C-17 as it leaves the perimeter of the airport. It was impossible to verify whether the two videos show the same people falling. 

A local press agency (CAUTION: graphic images) reported that residents saw three people fall and land on the roofs of houses, publishing photos of a body found on a rooftop.

Using visual indicators in videos of the event posted online, the FRANCE 24 Observers team was able to identify the direction the airplane took off in, as well as the location where the first victim was found. The body of one of the other victims fell on a roof in a neighbourhood to the west of the airport.

Masoud explained why people are trying to leave Kabul by any means necessary:

People are ready to risk their lives to get out of here, as you saw in the videos of people falling from the US military airplane. People grasp the tiniest chance they see.

Just imagine the most precious part of your city, wherever you live, and then imagine that ISIS has occupied it. You’d go crazy too, just like those poor people.

US army controls airport

Videos show the US army attempting to maintain order. A US army official said that troops had fired warning shots into the air in order to prevent people trying to force themselves into a military flight evacuating embassy staff. 

A Pentagon official told AFP that American soldiers had killed two men who were armed and brandishing their weapons. 

Later on Monday, the US halted all evacuation flights, waiting to clear people who had gathered on the airfield. A US military plane circled above the airport, unable to land on the tarmac, which was full of people. 

Additional US forces have been deployed to the airport to provide security and maintain control.

The Afghan aviation authority warned airlines to avoid Afghan airspace late Monday, saying that the airspace had been “released to the military”.