The mother of Emiliano Sala has relived the 'extremely distressing' wait for news after the plane carrying her son crashed into the English Channel in a heartbreaking testimony at his inquest.
Sala, 28, and pilot David Ibbotson, 59, died when their private single-engine Piper Malibu aircraft went down around 22 nautical miles north-west of Guernsey on January 21, 2019.
The Argentinian striker was being transported to Cardiff having just agreed a £15 million deal from French club Nantes.
On the first day of an inquest into his death at Dorset Coroner's Court, his mother, Mercedes Carina Taffarel, recalled her son's siblings, Dario and Romina, roaming the beaches of the Channel Islands calling his name in the desperate hope of finding him.
A month after the single engine Piper Malibu aircraft disappeared, Sala's body was recovered in the wreckage. The body of Mr Ibbotson has never been found.
Ms Taffarel said her son was ‘full of hope’ for the future as he had 'always desired to play' in the Premier League.
In a statement read to the court, she also called on the inquest to ‘leave no stone unturned’ and deliver justice for the family so her son could finally rest in peace.
The mother said: 'On January 23, at 6am Argentinian time, Emmy’s agent called Dario and told him that the plane was off the radar and they could not find him since the previous night which meant he had disappeared.
'Without any more information we were completely desperate. Emmy was having his best time and now this. There was an official search but they anticipated they they would stop searching very soon.
'Time passed without any news. It was extremely distressing thinking about where Emmy could be. When the search stopped we didn’t hesitate to hire a private team to continue.
'In the cold weather we walked on those islands calling his name, hoping to hear from him. We still had hope which ended in pain which abides to this day.
'As a family we did all we could to find the wreckage. His loss was a complete shock because he was such a pillar for us. The crash changed our lives. It is the worst thing that could have happened for us. Our lives have changed forever since that day.
Ms Taffarel also recalled the 'very intense' period between December 2018 and January 2019 in which 'a lot of pressure' was placed upon her son to complete the sale quickly.
‘Cardiff put a lot of pressure on him to complete the sale quickly but Nantes wanted more money and he felt in the middle of that. He felt in some doubt. Those weeks were intense,' Ms Taffarel stated.
But having made the decision, ‘Emi’ – as his mother knew him - approached his new career with the optimism he had always shown in his life, she related.
‘He was a young man with his whole life ahead of him, full of dreams for the future,’ Ms Taffarel said. ‘He was eager to learn about football in a league as important as the Premier League. He wanted to learn English and travel to the most important places in the United Kingdom as he loved travelling.’
Ms Taffarel’s words painted an intimate portrait of the way her eldest son had flourished in football despite great challenges in early life. He was born a month premature and after he experienced initial respiratory troubles, she was told by doctors that he might not be able to ‘run or make any physical effort.’
But when she took him, aged four, to a local sports club, San Martin de Progreso - simply because she was struggling to know what to do with such an energetic child - he flourished.
He had arrived there with trainers because she could not afford boots for him.
But he and football rapidly became a huge part of his life. With an initial absence of children to play football with, he enlisted his younger sister, Romina, who played in goal while he took penalties.
Ms Taffarel’s testimony laid bare the conflicts of a mother not wanting extended of separation from a child, yet feeling she had to let him go.
‘One time he came to me and told me I had to let him go,’ said Ms Taffarel. ‘That if I didn’t, I would be killing him.’ Initially he left for a club 15 hours and 200km away, in Cordoba, then for a team with academy links to Bordeaux.
The eventual move to France, where FC Bordeaux signed him as a 20-year-old, brought even more separation. The family had no money to visit, though he would be home with them as soon as each season ended, his mother said, asking for her home cooking and watching local league games in their town near Santa Fe.
The Cardiff move came at a time when her son seemed to feel ‘calm’ and extremely at home in Nantes, who bought him from Bordeaux in 2015.
Ms Taffarel also described the battle the family subsequently had with the British aviation authorities after they called off the search for the wreckage of the light aircraft.
She said: ‘We argued with the authorities but they didn’t want to keep searching. In very cold weather, we visited the Channel Islands, shouting Emi’s name, hoping to hear from him. It ended in pain. A pain that abides to this day.’
It was after a crowdfunding effort had allowed them to pay a private company to search that the wreckage was found off the coast of Guernsey, though the wreckage was not recovered.
A post mortem examination confirmed Mr Sala deid from head and trunk injuries. But it also revealed deadly levels of carbon monoxide in his body.
Senior Dorset Coroner Rachael Griffin told the inquest jury the Piper Malibu aircraft had left Nantes airport at 7.15pm on January 21 for the flight to Cardiff but radar contact was lost near Guernsey at 8.15pm.
She said the plane was located on the seabed on February 3 and Sala’s body was found in the wreckage three days later.
Ms Griffin said the inquest will hear a range of evidence from witnesses but the key questions for consideration will be the arrangements of the flight, the condition of the aircraft and the cause of the crash.
The inquest, which is taking place at the Town Hall in Bournemouth, is due to last around five weeks.
It has suffered several delays after David Henderson, the man who organised the flight, was charged and later convicted for recklessly endangering the aircraft.
Mr Ibbotson had been hired for the flight by Mr Henderson, 66, who was supposed to have been behind the controls on the fateful trip, but had contracted the job out because he was on holiday with his wife.
He was sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment at Cardiff Crown Court in November.