'The bed that saved me from the Taliban'
Vasileios Vasileiou next to the bed he hid inside while Taliban gunmen operated from his room
Just over a year ago, Greek pilot Vasileios Vasileiou checked into a luxury hilltop hotel in Kabul. The Intercontinental was popular with foreign visitors - which is why, on 20 January, Taliban gunmen stormed it, killing at least 40 people. Vasileios explains how he survived.
I had decided to go for dinner early - at six o'clock - with my friend, another pilot called Michael Poulikakos. It was the first time in the three or four months that I had been coming to the Intercontinental that I'd done this - usually I had dinner at around 8.30pm.
Vasileios Vasileiou and Michael Poulikakos worked for Afghan airline Kam Air
We finished dinner about 7.30pm and then I went up to my room - room 522 - on the top floor, to make some calls. At 8.47pm I was on the phone to Athens when I heard a big explosion down in the lobby.
I went out on to the balcony. I could see a man on the ground covered in blood and I could hear gunfire coming from inside and outside the hotel. I realised how lucky it was that I wasn't in the restaurant at that moment and said to myself, "OK Vasileios, you have to do something in order to survive."
Read more at: https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-46882917
It's interesting how he talks about some hiding place under the bed to hide, not just under the bed but that he cut the wall panel or something to hide, harrowing stuff and also, had to take measures to help him avoid smoke inhalation.
These terrorist attacks happen, have happened to a few hotels, one can envision themselves being caught in such a situation. The article is a little lengthy. 3-5 typed pages I'd say. Youtube has a few video clips, quite a lot of the movie through scenes of the 'Hotel Mumbai' movie. Better to find it for oneself, some of the violence is graphic.
Sticky on it, a good article to read.
