Taleranwadi villagers helped pilots

PUNE: It was an unusual site for the residents of village Taleranwadi, located near the Su 30 Mk-I jet crash site, when they witnessed a couple of parachutes sailing down to their farms. These were the two pilots, who had ejected from the fighter jet a few moments ago.
"I saw these balloon-like structures coming down slowly and felt a bit amused," said Dagdabai alias Baby Ramdas Hargude, one of the first witnesses, who was working on her farm."Soon, I realised that there were two persons coming down," she said.
Dagdabai said, "I saw this young boy (one of the pilots) falling some 20 m away from me and I ran towards him. He was shivering a bit, sweating and gesturing for water. I gave him water and raised an alarm to draw the attention of the people from the vicinity. He (the pilot) had minor injuries on his nose, lower jaw and was lying on the ground without much movement," she said.
The villagers rushed to the spot where the pilot had landed with his parachute, on hearing Dagadabai's call. "One of the first reactions of this boy was to ask about his colleague's whereabouts. He also asked for a cot to rest," she said.
Deputy sarpanch Santosh Hargude said, "The pilot sought a cellphone from one of us when we were unable to tell him anything about his colleague. Using it, he called his colleague's number and soon appeared to be more relaxed when he responded at the other end. He later called the authorities at the IAF base."
Sachin Hargude, a youngster from the village, said, "I saw the other pilot landing with a saffron parachute on the road after skilfully avoiding the overhead power supply lines. I ran towards him. He had injuries on the knee and some on his back, but he was able to walk on his own."
Zhumbar Hargude, another villager, said, "The two pilots were in the village for almost half an hour. The villagers gathered around them out of curiosity. Some of us tried to make them comfortable as we learnt that the Lohegaon air base authorities had sent a helicopter to pick them up."
At first, the IAF helicopter found it difficult to locate the place where the pilots were waiting. "One of the pilots sensed this and fired a red flair to signal their location to the approaching IAF chopper," Zhumbars said.
"The helicopter landed on a vacant space near the village as we rushed the two pilots towards the chopper," he added. Both the pilots told the villagers that they were grateful to them for the help.