Canadian Victims of Iran Crash Included Students, Doctors, Newlyweds

In the wake of the deadliest air disaster involving Canadians since the Air India bombing of 1985, Iranian-Canadians from Edmonton to Toronto are coming together to remember their loved ones.

Sara Saadat, her sister Saba Saadat, and their mother were among the 63 Canadian passengers aboard a passenger jet commuting from Iran to Kyiv, Ukraine, a common transit point for flights to and from Tehran, when it crashed early Wednesday morning, Saadat’s close friend Melika Motamedi confirmed.

Now, Motamedi, who studies medicine at the University of Alberta, is grieving the loss of her friend. Motamedi said Saadat was 22.

“The last text I sent to her was, ‘Tell me you’re not on the flight’ and she wasn’t responding,” Motamedi said. Then, the phone rang. It was Saadat’s father.

“Please tell me this isn’t real. This is all a dream and this isn’t happening,” the father told Motamedi’s family.

He called Motamedi’s family to say he had just lost his wife and two daughters in the crash.

Originally from Edmonton, Saadat was studying in California. Motamedi hopes people remember Saadat and her sister for their ambition and intelligence.

“Most of all, they were just such kind gentle souls,” Motamedi said. “They always cared about making the other person feel better and had so much life ahead of them.”

More victim stories are starting to surface. Canadians aboard the flight lived across Canada in Halifax, Toronto, Winnipeg, and Vancouver. At least 27 passengers were from Edmonton.

University of Manitoba researcher Amirhossien Ghasemi, 32, was flying back to Canada after visiting his mother in Iran during winter break. Ghasemi is one of eight confirmed victims from Winnipeg.

Amir Shirzadi, a graduate student at the U of M and board member with the school’s Iranian Student Association, was close friends with Ghasemi. He described the 32-year-old as someone who was extremely kind and deeply cared for the environment.

“It’s like a nightmare,” Shirzadi said. “I can’t imagine that he’s not going to be here anymore.”

Shirzadi also confirmed the deaths of Amirhossien Ghorbani, 21, Forough Khadem, 38, Mehdi Sadeghi, Anisa Sadeghi, 10, and Bahareh Haj Esfandiari, 41.

The scope of the loss is reverberating across Canada’s Iranian community.

Two sisters studying in Halifax, Masoumeh Ghavi, 30, and Mandieh Ghavi, 20, were flying back to Canada after visiting family in Iran; a student from Vancouver’s Langara College, Delaram Dadashnejad, was on the flight following a visit back home in Tehran; University of Alberta students, Arash Pourzarabi, 26, and Pouneh Gourji, 25, were returning to Edmonton with friends after getting married in Iran over the break.

A spokesperson with the Islamic Shia Ithna-Asheri Jamaat, a Toronto-based mosque, has confirmed to VICE that four of their members were on the plane when it went down. The dead include Saharnaz Haghjoo and her daughter, Elsa Jadidi, Afifa Tarbhai and her daughter, Alina Tarbhai, and Asgar Dhirani. They were returning from Ziyarat—an Islamic pilgrimage.

Shirzadi said he hopes Canadians pay attention to the victim stories when they arise.

“We owe the victims these stories,” Shirzadi said. “They were really young, many were getting an education…All I can remember is they were filled with kindness.”

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With files from Mack Lamoureux.