“ ) Escape from Kabul, CNN shows hard way to get to the airport

CNN's chief international correspondent, Clarissa Ward, was one of the thousands stuck at Kabul Airport waiting to leave.

After three weeks in Afghanistan, we join the crowd at Kabul Airport, the only exit point.

Clarissa: Everything's stuck here... There's too many cars...

Hundreds of people wait in the heat, hoping to leave.

Clarissa: We just managed to get into the airport complex and I have to say the atmosphere is very tense, the piles of desperate people, the screaming kids and the babies' mothers... You won't often see people so desperate.

The few people who get up here are exhausted and scared, but they're the lucky ones.

They've managed to get past the Taliban, Afghan guards, and finally they're in the airport siege. But you can't forget those who left behind.

Woman: We're leaving, and we're happy about it. But we're heartened about our country. Especially for those who can't leave, who are stuck here. We're really heartbreaking.

Clarissa: How do you feel about all the mothers with their little girls growing up under Taliban?

Woman: Pain, Many Pains

Clarissa: Now we're at the bottom of a very long time. The priority, of course, is to evacuate children and babies as soon as possible. But I think we'll stay here for a while.

We stay for hours under the scorching sun, all of us seek shelter wherever they can.

Patience is coming to an end.

It's an incredibly slow process, but they finally let us in.

We're on the track, already safe, but chaos continues.

Boy: I've been waiting two days. Since 3am yesterday.

Clarissa: Tell me what happened when you tried to get into the airport.

Boy: There were a lot of people fighting each other to break the road. But we did it in the end.

Clarissa: We're some of the lucky ones. Others, as they heard, wait for two days. And others go back because they don't have the right documents. There's no question that everyone's doing their best, but it's not clear if that's enough to get everyone out and it's not known how long they'll have to wait to complete this massive operation.