Assad's great escape: How Syria dictator fled the capital on private jet, dodged flight tracker, then switched planes at Russian airbase before flying to Moscow in Russian military plane
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Bashar Al-Assad's desperate escape from Syria as his regime came crashing down was planned by Russia and kept secret from even his closest aids and family members, sources have revealed. As rebel fighters closed in on Damascus it became clear that the brutal dictator's fate was being sealed, and Moscow decided to intervene to get him out of the country.
![[An An-124 heavy transport aircraft with its nose cone lifted, at the Russian Hmeimim airbase, near Latakia, Syria, last Friday]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/17/16/93144079-14201439-An_An_124_heavy_transport_aircraft_with_its_nose_cone_lifted_at_-a-3_1734453619343.jpg)
Telling no one of the plans, he boarded his private jet from the capital's airport in the early hours of December 8. The plane headed towards the Mediterranean Sea before disappearing from the map, presumably as pilots turned off the transponder that tracks flights and reports their position to air traffic control.
![[Flightradar24 showed a plane heading from the Syrian capital Damascus towards the Mediterranean Sea in the early hours of Sunday morning]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/17/16/92953797-14201439-Flightradar24_showed_a_plane_heading_from_the_Syrian_capital_Dam-a-4_1734453687264.jpg)
It vanished shortly after making a U-turn as it made its way over the city of Homs - seemingly along the route to the Russian Hmeimim airbase in the northeastern city of Latakia. The presidential jet is then believed to have landed at the base, where Assad was transferred to a Russian military plane and flown under the radar to Moscow.
![[An image of Syrian President Bashar Assad, riddled with bullets, is seen on the facade of the provincial government office in the aftermath of the opposition's takeover of Hama, Syria, Friday, Dec. 6, 2024]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/17/16/93241057-14201439-image-a-2_1734453546203.jpg)
His immediate family, including British-born wife Asma and three adult children, were waiting for him there after they were granted asylum by Vladimir Putin. Within hours of him fleeing, rebels led by Islamist group Ha'yat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) seized the capital Damascus and declared Syria to be free from his tyranny.
