Missing Premier League footballer Emiliano Sala sent a WhatsApp voice message saying he was scared shortly before his aeroplane vanished over the English Channel on Monday.
He can be heard telling friends they might have to ‘send someone to find me’ with the noise of the engine in the background.
Speaking in Spanish he said: ‘Hey guys, how is it going? Brother, I am really tired now. I was over in Nantes sorting things out, doing this, doing that.
‘I am now aboard a plane that seems like it is falling to pieces. I’m going to Cardiff now, crazy, and tomorrow we get going.
I will train with my new team tomorrow.’ A little later he asks if everyone is ‘all good’ before saying: ‘If you do not have any more news from me in an hour and a half, I don’t know if they need to send someone to find me. I am getting scared!’
During his final goodbye to his teammates in Nantes, he said that he feared for his safety ahead of the flight.
Rescue workers this morning resumed their search for a plane carrying Cardiff City’s new record signing Emiliano Sala at sunrise after the light aircraft disappeared over the English Channel.
Five aircraft and two lifeboats scoured more than 1,000 square miles for traces of the plane on Monday after it disappeared from radar en route from Nantes in France to Cardiff.
Guernsey Police said the chances of passenger survival were ‘slim’, with Cardiff City’s chief executive having said everyone at the club is in ‘shock’.
Sala had scored 12 goals in 19 games in Ligue 1 for Nantes this season and was brought in to bolster the attack for the Premier League strugglers for a fee of around £15 million.
The 28-year-old posted a picture with his former Nantes team-mates on Monday captioned ‘the last goodbye’ before flying to Wales.
John Fitzgerald, chief officer of Channel Islands Air Search, said: ‘I think with the sea temperatures and the sea conditions, the chances of finding anybody alive are reducing all the time.
‘The sea temperatures are very, very cold and just sap the core temperature of anybody in the water very, very quickly.’
