Dagestani wrestling coach heroically rescues six people from burning car

A Dagestani wrestling coach is being lauded as a hero after assisting in the rescue of six people from a burning car in Moscow.…

By: Karim Zidan | 1 year ago
Dagestani wrestling coach heroically rescues six people from burning car
Bloody Elbow 2.0 | Anton Tabuena

A Dagestani wrestling coach is being lauded as a hero after assisting in the rescue of six people from a burning car in Moscow.

Arslanbek Aliyev happened to be walking by to visit his friends when he saw a Mercedes hit the rear of a taxi at high speed, sending it off course and into the wall of a nearby building on Zubovsky Boulevard. The Mercedes burst into flames moments after colliding with the wall, which led to Aliyev run to the scene to help the victims.

“We ran out at the sound of fire, immediately the car began to burn,” Aliyev later explained.

The accident was captured on CCTV footage, which has since gone viral on alternative social media platforms like Telegram.

According to Aliyev, a former winner of the Russian freestyle wrestling championships and the head coach of Dagestan’s youth wrestling team, law enforcement officers that arrived on scene attempted to stop from him from providing assistance but he still managed to break the car’s window and help people out of the wreck with the help of other bystanders.

“The police forbade us to approach,” he explained. “We broke the windows, doors with Arab guys. They were the first to start it all. And they pulled all the guys out. The front ones, who were squeezed, could not (pull out), there was a very strong fire.”

Officials later confirmed that the driver and the front-seat passenger had died in the accident, though the rest of the occupants were being treated in hospital.

Members of Russia’s State Duma (lower parliament) have promised to award Aliyev for his bravery. “Such actions should not go unnoticed,” noted Dmitry Svishchev, head of the Duma Committee on Physical Culture and Sports.

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About the author
Karim Zidan
Karim Zidan

Karim Zidan is a investigative reporter and feature writer focusing on the intersection of sports and politics. He has written for BloodyElbow since 2014 and has served as an associate editor since 2016. He also writes for The New York Times and The Guardian. Karim has been invited to speak about his work at numerous universities, including Princeton, and was a panelist at the South by Southwest (SXSW) film festival and the Oslo Freedom Forum. He also participated in the United Nations counter-terrorism conference in 2021. His reporting on Ramzan Kadyrov’s involvement in MMA, much of which was done for Bloody Elbow, has led to numerous award nominations, and was the basis of an award-winning HBO Real Sports documentary.

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