Miracle survivors of a plane crash revealed how his life was saved by a change of seat at the last minute

When Zafar Masud thinks about the difference between his miraculous survival and death, which demanded almost all of his fellow travelers, one of the most important reasons for his survival in his simple preference for a gang place.

If Mr. Masud looks back on this fateful morning two years ago, many of his actions are important.

his decision to take a later flight than originally planned, or the flight, which was unusually punctual, have become important points in its survival history. But maybe nothing more than his late decision to switch from a place at the window to 1c in the corridor.

"I think that the location of this seat plays a very important role for my survival," said Mr. Masud to the Telegraph.

Sunday marks the second anniversary of the terrible plane crash in Karatschi when a jet of the national airline Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) landed in a residential area after a broken landing, where he scratched his engines over the runway at high speed.

Mr. Masud was one of only two survivors. The remaining 97 crew members and passengers died together with one person on the ground.

As one of the most prominent bankers in the country, he is used to a world of hard numbers. But in the past two years he had to put up with the life -changing personal monsterness of being almost the only survivor of a crash in which the probabilities seem to be impossible.

"I don't doubt that it was a miracle," he explains the headquarters of his bank in Lahore in his office on the eighth floor. "It can't be different."

The crash left him the fault of a permanent survivor, but also changed his view of life.

"This is a bonus life that I lead," he says. "I live in the borrowed sky. I have to make sure that I do all the things that are required by me who have a positive impact on people in their lives."

Mr. Masud had taken over the management of the Bank of Punjab just a few weeks before the crash, after a prestigious career with stations at American Express, Citibank, Barclays and others.

He took over the reins as President and Chief Executive, while the country was in the first wave of Covid Lockdown, and tried to run a bank from his house in Karatschi by conference call.

He finally flew to Lahore to manage the bank personally, and should fly back to Karatschi at the end of the Muslim fasting month at the end of the Muslim fasting month.

In the morning of May 22, 2020, he was supposed to take an early flight, but since he was a habitual late riser, he changed his ticket to a later flight that was specially intended for additional oath.

A new assistant who did not know Mr. Masud's preference for sitting on the corridor had booked a place next to the window. The banker asked him to change it.

Boarding and the start took place shortly after 1 p.m. and were unusually fast and quick. "Everything seems to be in a hurry or on time, as if there is something imminent," he recalls.

He worked on the plane and remembered nothing unusual until they ended up in Karatschi.

Instead of landing, the Airbus A320 hit the runway three times hard and took off again to get another approach.

A preliminary examination of the plane crash showed that the plane was usually flown quickly and steeply, since the pilots seemed to be distracted by a discussion about covid.

The investigators found that the pilots had extended the chassis 10 miles away, but inexplicably raised it about five miles before the finish.

The unevenness that the passengers felt were when the aircraft scratched the asphalt with its engines before it took off.

Mr. Masud said that he was not excessively worried until he noticed the reaction of the stewards who sat and cried nearby.

The pilots tried to bring the plane back, but the impact on the floor had badly damaged the engines and gave them up when the aircraft turned.

At that moment the cockpit door flew up, says Mr. Masud, and he could see that the plane wouldn't make it.

"I realized that the plane was rumbling. It became clear to me that it is all over now. It will not survive. That is all done," he said.

Mr. Masud says that he does not follow religious rituals, but has a strong spiritual belief and often speaks to himself.

He said: "I said God, the game is over. Somehow I got this feedback: 'Yes, but it will be fine'. I said, 'How can it be okay? It is inevitable, it can't be averted anyway. Yes, it will happen, but they will survive.

he passed out before the impact. He believes that he owes his survival to the fall of his seat out of the plane when it broke apart after it had hit buildings in Karachi's Model Colony.

his seat seems to have hit a three -story building before fell onto a bonnet that broke off the fall. Three people were in the car and helped save him.

"How big is the likelihood that someone in this area was also sitting in his car when the aircraft crashed?" he asks. "Very remote, right?"

he was dragged with nothing more than a heavily broken arm and torn ligaments in the knee from the burning crash site.

The power of power saved him mental injuries, he believes, but he suffered from strong feelings of guilt that he survived while others did not do it.

"I started avoiding the families of the victims and other survivors," he explains. By default, it makes them ask questions to their God: "If this man can be given a miracle, why not our loved ones?"

"This is something that bothered me very much."

While he was recovering, he decided that he had to forced himself for his own recovery and an example to fly again. He decided to take the same flight on the same route. He was back in 1c. Since then he has flown dozens of times.

His experience caused him to found a foundation that will raise awareness of the security of passengers and, if necessary, work for new laws.

He returned to work at the bank, but says that the crash has changed its prospects. The bank now spends more for art and he says that he is more interested in influencing people's lives positively.

"I keep remembering that this is a borrowed sky, this is the gift of my God and I have to pay him back," he said.

"By doing all of these things that I think about and I think my God agrees with me. I thank my God all the time."