I helped evacuate aid workers from Kabul airport as the Taliban closed in

For months now the situation in Afghanistan has been deteriorating as the Taliban continued their remorseless advance across the country.

But this weekend it came to a tragic conclusion when they took the capital city Kabul.

The harrowing images of desperate Afghans clinging to the sides of the US aircraft on a Monday were heartbreaking. It's difficult to see the desperation. And what you don't see is the behind-the-scenes work of evacuating NGO and humanitarian staff during a crisis.

Diversity Travel works with around 2,000 customers who we deal with on a regular basis when they're travelling around the world, whether that's getting them into a conflict zone to provide aid or flying supplies and extra help to humanitarian disaster areas.

We've got access to the airlines' global distribution system (GDS), which is where all the airlines store their inventory. It means we can look up the availability of flights leaving Afghanistan at a moment's notice and book workers a ticket out of there in seconds. Knowing aid staff won't always have access to all their equipment, they don't even need to show email proof of the ticket when they get to the airport - the reference number will get them on that flight.

August 16, 2021: Afghan people climb up on a plane and sit by the door as they wait at Kabul airport ( AFP via Getty Images)

Our speciality also means we can hold a seat open for someone who isn't yet sure they can leave the country without having to book it on the spot. The price of airline seats can change rapidly in a situation like Kabul, where the flights are getting busier the closer it is to take-off.

We've also got a long-standing relationship with the UN and the World Food Programme, which allows us access to their emergency flights, in places where scheduled airlines have been unable to reach.

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In the last week we evacuated 11 people from Kabul, including six or seven over the weekend as the capital city fell to Taliban rule. Luckily we got them out before the airspace over Afghanistan became a no-fly zone, although there are a handful of customers still out there who decided to hold tight and see how the situation unfolds.

Crowds wait under the sun at Kabul airport on August 16 after the capital fell to the Taliban and thousands tried to flee ( AFP via Getty Images)

I think that's what a lot of the the aid agencies are doing at the moment, just seeing what the situation is and taking it from there. Many of the staff out there are ground staff anyway, so they're trained for this kind of situation. But obviously that still means leaving them behind.

Not only did we have Afghanistan to contend with this weekend, we were also flying out aid workers to Haiti to deal with the horrific earthquake there.

We've worked with some very high-profile customers in the past and helped provide support for some very difficult circumstances. We were sending hundreds of passengers a month to Sierra Leone and Monrovia when the 2014 ebola outbreak happened

Desperate people climbed on planes in an attempt to secure a flight out of Kabul ( AFP via Getty Images)

For people travelling in very difficult, stressful situations, it makes a huge difference having one of our staff on the end of the phone dealing with their request rather than an anonymous booking system.

It feels good to be able to support those doing such amazing work in other parts of the world.

*Matthew Truin is the Director of Global Supplier Relations at Diversity Travel

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