The painful truth about the order has emerged... Ali Özdemir, who delivered flowers to martyr Zahide Güçlü Ekici, speaks out!

Thirty-seven-year-old Zahide Güçlü Ekici, who worked as an engineer at TUSAŞ, lost her life in the terrorist attack carried out as she came to the campus gate to collect the flowers sent by her husband for their 14th wedding anniversary.

Ali Özdemir, who took the ordered flowers from Eryaman to TUSAŞ, also escaped the attack by a margin of 20 minutes.

REPEATED MISHAPS HAD OCCURRED

Özdemir said the flowers had been ordered online and that there had been repeated mishaps concerning the flowers.

Özdemir said the following:

"When we take the flowers out from here, we first photograph the flowers and send them for the sender’s approval. Our driver friend here mistakenly photographed and sent a different flower, but approval came despite that. Later, we changed the flower to the one requested, but there was a mishap with that flower. In fact, before going there, we normally drop off the flowers in the Saray area and then go there. Something protected us that day; we had no orders at all for the Saray area and went directly to TUSAŞ. Maybe if we had been held up beforehand, we too would have been caught right in the middle of the clash."

Özdemir said he arrived at TUSAŞ at 15.00 and left 4-5 bouquets, including the one ordered for Ekici, at the mail distribution center at the gate where the attack took place. He said he called Ekici at 15.06 and told her he had left the red roses and chocolate, her wedding anniversary gift, at the mail center.

Özdemir said they were shocked when they heard about the attack, and added:

"We had no idea about anything and returned to the shop. Around 16.00, we learned there had been a terrorist attack there. 

When we looked, we understood that it was exactly where we had left the flowers, and that we had delivered the flowers going to Ms. Zahide. We were very upset. 

We made the delivery, but I wish we hadn’t. It was the most painful order of my life, an order I will never forget until the day I die. I wish we had gone a little earlier or a little later so that order would not have gone. 

Apparently, some of the flowers we left are still at the mail center. Maybe it was fate; perhaps they would have coincided with that time too. God willing, we will never be subjected to something like this again."