Witnesses recall the horror of PIA crash

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 Witnesses recall the horror of PIA crash

Islamabad - "I could hear screams of survivors for help"

By Web Report

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Published: Fri 9 Dec 2016, 3:19 PM

Last updated: Sat 10 Dec 2016, 9:13 AM

As PIA's flight PK-661 crashed en route to Islamabad from Chitral on Wednesday, there were people who saw the crash. The witnesses to the crash reveal shocking details as they saw the plane coming down.
"I could hear screams of survivors for help. They were faint, but clearly audible from afar. Before we could reach the mangled plane, it burst into a fireball," villager Zahid Khan was quoted saying by The Express Tribune. He was the first to reach the site of the crash.
The crash killed 48 people onboard including pop star-turned-evangelist Junaid Jamshed.
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A police constable and resident of Mujahth village, Zahid stated the plane circled over his village at a menacingly low altitude before nose-diving into the hills of Gagan in the neighbouring Batolni village.
"Moments before the crash, the emergency exit of the plane opened and eight to nine passengers jumped off, but unfortunately, the plane fell on them," claims Zahid.
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"I was the first person to reach the site nearly 10 minutes after the crash. The fuselage was split into three parts and there was fire on two parts. I could clearly hear cries of passengers for help,"Zahid said. "Before I could do something, the fuel tank exploded and the fuselage burst into a fireball."
He added that he was chasing the plane on motorcycle while he called friends by cellphone when it went down.
Soon he was joined by other villagers carrying pitchers filled with water, bags full of sand and soil to dose the fire. Before the police and rescue operations reached the site, the villagers managed to extinguish the fire within two hours. "All the bodies were mutilated - and burned to a cinder," Zahid says.
It was Zahid only who discovered that Junaid Jamshed and his wife were on the flight. He had found his wallet and visiting cards which he handed over to the police.
"I had also found the CNIC of Chitral's district commissioner Osama Ahmed Warriach."
"Villagers in Mujahth and Batolni could see the plane from the rooftops of their homes. And after it crashed, all villagers, including women rushed to the site to help with rescue efforts," said SHO Havelian Pervez Khan
 


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