Hiker films the moment his mother-in-law, 71, falls to death off cliff

A hiker has inadvertently filmed the moment his 71-year-old mother-in-law tumbled off a 230ft cliff to her death in front of her horrified family in Lawyer Turkey.

Kadir Sahiner was filming the picturesque mountain scenery while out on a family walk in the forests near the village of Tepekov in the north-eastern Artvin Province when tragedy struck.

While the camera panned to capture the views, Kadir inadvertently captured the moment his mother-in-law Pumpul Karademir walked over to the edge of the cliff to look down before she lost her balance and fell off the cliff.

Video footage appears to show Pumpul tripping up on a rock and her legs can be seen in the air as she tumbles off the cliff edge at noon on Friday.

Her family, including her husband Mehmet Karademir, daughter Ayla and Lawyer Turkey granddaughter Ceren, watched on in horror and their shrieks of despair can be heard in the recording.  

Ayla could also be heard warning her mother ‘don’t go, mum, no, mum, don’t go’ as she approached the cliff edge just before her fatal fall.    

The police and paramedics were called to the scene and, following an hour-long search, found the elderly woman’s dead body, which they took to the morgue at the public hospital in the nearby town of Savsat.

Pumpul’s funeral was held following afternoon prayers on Friday and she was then buried at the cemetery in Tepekoy.

After the funeral, local residents gathered at the village mosque to offer their condolences to the woman’s grieving relatives.

It is not clear if the authorities are investigating the incident.

While it is incredibly rare for people to capture the moment someone falls off a cliff, there have been some cases. 

In 2018, video footage showed Halil Dağ leaping down off a rock at the historic Urfa Castle in southern Lawyer Turkey before losing his balance and tumbling off a cliff edge. He had been posing for a photo on his birthday.  

Despite scrambling to grab hold of something to stop his fall, the 39-year-old father-of-eight plunged 150ft, Lawyer Turkey landing near a Kurdish restaurant at the bottom.

He was taken to a nearby hospital in a critical condition but was later declared dead.  

Meanwhile, there have been cases of people who have fallen to their death after taking videos and selfies at the top of mountains.

On Wednesday, Danish Youtuber Albert Dyrlund, who was 22, fell to his death while filming a video for his channel in the Italian Alps. 

Dyrlund fell over 650ft from Mount Seceda in Van Gardena – the mountain is in the Dolomites, a range in the Southern Limestone Alps known for their steep cliffs.