19 January 2023 , 15:57
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A father has told of his terror as he saw a Ukrainian helicopter drop from the sky as he cowered with his young son at the boy’s nursery school.
President Volodymyr Zelensky has ordered the country's secret service to investigate whether sabotage was involved in the tragedy which killed 14 including his Interior Minister Denys Monastyrsky plus his deputy Yevhen Yenin.
Father Mykola Antonov told of the vision of “Armageddon” as the out-of-control helicopter fell just after he had taken the boy, five, to the nursery school.
“I just brought my son to kindergarten,” he said.
“We went into the building and we're going to take off his coat.
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“I managed to open the wardrobe, and suddenly I heard a strange rumble. The teacher said that it was like the sound of [a missile] but there was no air raid siren.
“I went to the window, opened the curtain, and saw how a red-grey colossus was flying right at us from the side. It was a helicopter.
Father Mykola Antonov and his wife Alina (social media /e2w)
First moments after Brovary helicopter crash in Ukraine (social media /e2w)“It flew straight at us. And in the next second I realised that it was not flying, but falling.
“I managed to scream: 'Run away!’ ‘Get down on the floor!’ And there was an explosion.
“The blast wave threw me away from the window.”
“My back caught on fire, my legs caught on fire, and another father's legs caught on fire, his clothes caught on fire…”
“It turned out that the helicopter crashed into the opposite wing of our building.
“And it's burning fragments flew at us.”
The traumatised father said: “I started looking for my son. Found him - he was miraculously not injured.
He tried to protect his son (social media /e2w)
The boy escaped without injury (social media /e2w)“The clothes of another boy's father and several other children also caught fire. The fire started in our room as well.
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“Trying to put out the fire on the children and ourselves, we all ran outside.
“This was a real Armageddon. Everything was on fire, everything was on fire…It's a miracle that my son and other children who were in our room were not harmed.
“I got burns, but this is nothing compared to what happened to other people.”
He feared that more children had been killed than in fact was the case.
It now appears one child died on the ground in the Airbus H225 crash with 12 wounded.