‘No Eid in Our Home’: Pakistani Families Mourn Crash Victims

As Fazal Rahmaan, 80, and his wife, Wahida Rahmaan, 74, boarded a plane in Lahore , Pakistan, on Friday, their family's biggest fear was that they might catch the coronavirus on their way to Karachi.

Instead the couple, who had been married for 54 years, were among the 97 people killed when a Pakistan International Airlines-operated Airbus A320 crashed into a Karachi neighborhood-the worst air accident in Pakistan since 2012.

“We held many calls deliberating with doctors and family ... Our biggest concern was that they made the trip safely,” said their son, Inam Ur Rahmaan, who instead of welcoming his parents for the Eid al-Fitr holiday found himself picking through the wreckage of flight PK8303 praying for a miracle.

“I got in my car and followed the smoke and the ambulances,” said Rahmaan.

“When I saw the area, I realized that it would be a miracle if they had made it.”

There were two survivors from the aircraft on board, whereas no fatalities were reported on the ground in the densely packed neighborhood of multi-story homes at the east edge of Jinnah International Airport where the aircraft descended.

More than two dozen houses were destroyed when the airliner flew in, leaving a tangle of torn electrical cables and exposed rebar-a shattered wing lying on the side of the house, with an aircraft on the ground nearby.

The jet fuel set the wreckage ablaze, along with homes and vehicles, sending black smoke into the sky, a Reuters witness said.

Crowds rushed to the site, relatives searching for loved ones, rescue workers, and curious people. Scores of ambulances and fire engines jammed the narrow, debris-stricken streets.

One emergency worker told Reuters that two corpses were discovered wearing oxygen masks. Many bodies pulled out of the wreckage were charred beyond recognition.

The airline’s chief executive said on Friday the last message from the pilot indicated a technical problem. A team from Airbus is due to arrive on Monday to investigate, a PIA spokesman said.

“They’ll provide all possible assistance including decoding the black box,” the spokesman Khan, referring to the flight data recorder.

SCREAMS AND FIRE

Shahid Ahmed, 45, was at the airport waiting for his mother to arrive. When he reached the crash site he saw rescuers retrieving bodies and people taking selfies.

“There was no one responsible at the site, people were busy posing for pictures,” said a distraught Ahmed, who lost his mother, Dishad Begum, 75, who was also flying to Karachi for Eid.

After scouring the site and failing to find his mother, Ahmed went to look for her in hospitals.

“There was no list of the dead or injured at any of the hospitals, it was all chaos and mismanagement,” said Ahmed, who sobbed as he recounted the ordeal.

“Searching for our mother’s body was a nightmare.”

One of the survivors, engineer Muhammad Zubair, told Geo News that the pilot had landed, touched down momentarily, and then pulled up again.

He declared that he would make a second attempt soon before the plane crashed, Zubair said from the hospital.

“I could hear screams from all directions. Kids and adults. All I could see was fire. I couldn’t see any people – just hear their screams,” he said.

Rahmaan said his family was still in shock.

“There’s no Eid in our home,” he said.

Rahmaan said he took some comfort from knowing his parents always wanted to be with each other.

“Whatever’s happened, whatever the reason behind it, they always wanted to be together. In the end, they were together.”

Source: Reuters