Pilot’s Final Message Before Crash that Killed 38 (Video)

This is the heartbreaking moment a man sent a last message to his wife seconds before the Azerbaijan Airlines was reportedly shot down before a crash that killed 38. 

The passenger identified as Subkhon Rakhimov started filming a video for his wife as soon as he realised the plane was losing altitude, telling her that the plane tried to land several times, after which the people on board heard a loud bang.

His footage shows oxygen masks hanging from the ceiling and passengers can be heard crying and praying, with damage visible inside the cabin minutes before the plane crashed and broke apart in Kazakhstan, leaving 38 people dead. 

Rakhimov miraculously survived the crash and filmed another video as he walked around the plane wreckage, praising the flight attendant for helping the passengers survive. 

This comes as evidence is piling up that Russian air defences hit the Azerbaijan Airlines plane, which was likely wrongly targeted as a suspected Ukrainian drone.

The apparent shrapnel damage to the aircraft – seen on the intact rear section of the doomed aircraft at Aktau in Kazakhstan – is consistent with such a strike. So are the accounts of surviving passengers who spoke of an explosion outside the plane.

At the time the plane had been seeking to land as scheduled in Grozny in Chechnya, a Russian region headed by close Vladimir Putin warlord Ramzan Kadyrov, which has been under regular attacks from Ukraine in recent weeks.

It is Kadyrov’s forces who are suspected of firing a Pantsir-S1 at the plane.

A partial text release of the alleged communications between the pilots and air traffic control indicates a catastrophic event which the crew assumed – it now appears wrongly – to be a collision with a flock of birds. 

Meanwhile, Azerbaijan observed a nationwide day of mourning for the victims of the air crash.

National flags were lowered across Azerbaijan this morning, traffic across the country stopped at noon, and signals were sounded from ships and trains as the country observed a nationwide moment of silence for the victims of the horrifying crash.

Footage from the crash site shows rescuers looking for survivors inside the Azerbaijan airlines flight from Baku to the Russian city of Grozny, which crashed with 67 passengers and five crew members on board.

There was mayhem as rescuers went inside the severed rear of the aircraft, where several people can be seen lying on the ground. Astonishingly, some were found still alive.

One trapped woman shouted at rescuers: ‘Help me please!’. A firefighter asked her whether she needed help to get up, and she confirmed that she would need to be lifted out of the debris.

It is understood that at least 29 people reported to have survived the crash were found in the rear section of the aircraft, with the front being badly destroyed by fire. 

Latest figures indicate 22 of the 29 survivors are being treated in hospital, seven of whom are in serious condition. At least ten people dying after reportedly being thrown out of the cabin.