Afghani Refugees On A C-17 Transport

This week's Plane & Pilot Photo of the Week picked itself. It is a shot of more than 600 Afghani refugees packed into the hold of a United States Air Force C-17 transport plane being flown to safe harbor. It's not a record---that would be the 1990 flight of an El Al Boeing 747 that carried 1,088 Ethiopian Jews to safety. In the case of this photo, the refugees are fleeing feared retaliation from the Taliban for their cooperation with United States forces during the 20-year war in that country. The context is everything here. The photo is incredibly compelling, not only because of the state of the country that was their home and that they are now fleeing without anything but the clothes on their backs, but also because it is a story of escape. As hard as their lives could be from here on out, it is nothing like what they feared would happen if they stayed behind.