At least two people were killed at Hamid Karzai International Airport Monday as they clung to a US Air Force aircraft which was taking off and fell to their deaths.
Video from the airport shows thousands of desperate Afghani citizens chasing after and grabbing onto the aircraft as it moved down the runway and took off.
The two young men who attempted to hitch a ride on the outside of the plane fell hundreds off feet onto the tarmac seconds after takeoff.
A total of five people are believed to have been killed in the chaos at the airport.
US forces and civilian personnel are evacuating Afghanistan as the Taliban has seized control of the country, having captured the capital of Kabul yesterday.
Tens of thousands of Afghani citizens are attempting to flee, fearing for their rights under Taliban rule or retribution for having cooperated with American and coalition forces.
UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace stated Monday that "some people will not get back” from Afghanistan who are attempting to flee the country.
“I think we all saw and felt a real sense of sadness that first of all the forces that the British and the international community had invested in had melted away in some areas so quickly,” Wallace told Sky News. “You don’t fix things overnight in global issues; you have to manage them … When that deal was done a few years ago, what happened was ultimately we undermined the community … [and] the Afghan government.”
Wallace added that it was a “really deep part of regret for me” that it would not be possible to rescue all Afghans eligible for entrance to the UK, even though Britain hopes to succeed in evacuating around 1000 people per day.
“My job as Defense Secretary is to make sure that we protect not only the UK nationals, but those Afghans we have an obligation to; that is actually why we’re in the country,” he noted. “For the last few weeks, we’ve been in the country solely to process those people and to make sure we protect our officials doing that job, and we’ll continue to do so.”