Wicknell Chivayo: Last chilling words of pilot carrying late billionaire emerge

A security aide attached to prominent Zimbabwean businessman Wicknell Chivayo has broken his silence on the harrowing final moments before a helicopter crash that killed five people on September 30, 2026. The aide, who was aboard a separate helicopter travelling alongside Chivayo's aircraft, described a sequence of increasingly desperate radio exchanges from the pilot of the second chopper as conditions in the sky deteriorated sharply on the return journey. Both helicopters had been heading back when the weather turned hostile. The pilot carrying Chivayo proposed rerouting via Bromley as an alternative, and communication between the two cockpits continued for a while after that. "What I observed during the pilots' communication was that the pilot flying the boss kept saying: 'I'm in bad weather, I haven't exited the cloud,'" the aide recounted, as reported by ZimLive. With each transmission, the situation grew more alarming. The troubled pilot's last confirmed position placed him somewhere over Surrey. When the aide's pilot radioed that they were roughly ten minutes from their destination, the response from the other helicopter raised immediate alarm. "The pilot flying the boss appeared confused, asking, 'Which destination?' Our pilot responded that Marondera, but no reply came. All communication with the other helicopter was lost," the aide said. That silence was the last contact anyone had with the aircraft. It subsequently crashed, claiming the lives of everyone on board, including Chivayo himself, who had been among the passengers on the ill-fated flight. The aide also addressed inaccurate figures that had spread in the immediate aftermath of the disaster. Initial reports circulating after the crash put the number of deaths at six, but the aide stated firmly that five people died in the incident. No further details about the identities of the other victims were confirmed in his account. The crash has attracted significant public attention given Chivayo's high profile in Zimbabwe. His eyewitness account offers the clearest picture yet of what transpired in those final, desperate minutes before the aircraft went down.Source: legit.ng
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