'Come back home': The two young Afghans who fell from a US military jet

As the Taliban took over Afghanistan on August 15, Suleiman Safi made his way to Kabul's airport, his brother Yousuf said, without informing his family.

Safi was not fearful of the Taliban's harsh rule returning, but the economic instability that could follow, his brother recalls.

"He was the sole breadwinner of the family. He even went to work on Sundays to bring money home everyday," Yousuf told TRT World.

"He was worried about making ends meet after the Taliban took over."

With him were tens of thousands of people gathered at the city's Hamid Karzai International airport to escape the country.

Amid chaotic scenes, hundreds of people were running alongside a taxiing US Air Force transport plane, some clung on to the side of the plane.

Safi also held onto the plane as it took off.

Seconds later, he lost his grip and fell to his death.

Safi's fall is one of the many chaotic scenes from that day still circulating on social media as the US reaches the final chapter of its military campaign in Afghanistan. 

"Safi's mother cries for him every night calling his name, asking him to come back home," Yousuf said.

The Air Force said a C-17 crew decided to “depart the airfield as quickly as possible” as hundreds of Afghan civilians had breached the airport perimeter and were on the runway, according to the statement from Ann Stefanek, chief of media operations for the Air Force.

Stefanek also said human remains also were found in the wheel well of the aircraft after it landed at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar. 

In one of the harrowing videos circulating online, at least a dozen people clung to hatches and landing gear trying to flee Kabul. 

In another, two bodies fell from the plane as it accelerated upward.

One of them was Safi and another a promising teenage football player, Zaki Anwari. 

"I lost a part of my body, Zaki was my heart," Zaki's mother told TRT World. 

"He was the youngest of all my children, we could not tolerate anything even a small scratch on him."

Zaki,17, was a high-school senior and a member of the national youth football team. He was loved by his friends who described him as a "polite and innocent" person.

"A week before his death, I went to see him and he talked about his plans to pursue a career in football. After a week, I got the news that he is dead," Zaki's friend, Abobakir Darwish, told TRT World. 

Afghanistan's General Directorate of Body and Sports said in a statement that Anwari was of the "several other compatriots who fell to the ground while flying" in search of a "better future in America."

"They died and were martyred," the post said, "may his soul rest in peace and his memory be remembered."

Zaki's brother Zakir Anwari said although his brother was was born two years after the US-led forces ousted the Taliban, stories of the group's brutal regime of the 1990s caused fear over what was lying ahead. 

Zakir recalled his brother saying that the Taliban group's return back in power would crush his dream of becoming an international football player. 

Despite Taliban reassurances of amnesty and no reprisal against the civilian population, tens of thousands of Afghans were still trying to flee. 

"Zaki's last call was to his mother, asking her to pray for him as he reached the airport," Zakir said.

"A couple of hours later, we received a call that Zaki Anwari has died."