Emotional reunions inside Logan airport Thursday, as the lucky few who made it on one of the few flights out of Israel were finally out of danger.
“I’ve had little sleep and have been unable to concentrate but when that plane took off last night and I knew she was on her way home, it was overwhelming,” said Susan Kornetsky of Sharon, who scrambled to book a flight home for her daughter Rachel.
It was no easy feat to even get on a flight out of Tel Aviv with so many airlines canceling and so many people attempting to flee the country.
“It was complete chaos at the airport because there were so many people, so many tourists trying to get back, so there was a line of about 4 or 5 hours," said Alain Pacawoski, of Boston.
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Lance Irwin, who was on a tour in Israel, said, “The airport was crazy. Like I said, a lot of people were just spending the night there just waiting to get a ticket, but the tickets were like three or four days out that they could get.”
But passengers on this El Al flight Thursday morning told us it was much worse outside Israel's Ben Gurion Airport – with attacks from Hamas unpredictable and savage.
“We met a soldier on Friday who died Saturday, and it’s just, it’s heartbreaking,” Irwin said.
“You hear the jets overhead non-stop. Every single day, explosions going off in the distance. You don’t know at night who could be outside,” said Zoe Odenwalder, who made it onto the flight, but whose parents are still trying to get out.
They all said it became normal to hear the sirens go off and to have to seek shelter immediately.
"In our area there were also missiles that fell, and we felt how the building was shaken," said Yehuda Bergman, whose sons remain in Israel.
Steven Lefkowitz, of Swampscott, said, “We were in the bomb shelter probably four or five times. The sirens would go off and you would have to evacuate.”
Flights out of Israel continue to be sparse.
There was a Delta flight from Tel Aviv scheduled to arrive Thursday afternoon, but that has since been canceled.
