Jewish Family Leaves Soviet Turmoil Behind : Immigrants: After tense days of fear that the coup might prevent their leaving, they arrive in Orange County for happy reunion with relatives.

COSTA MESA —  After waiting through three anxious days of political turmoil in the Soviet Union, a family of Jewish immigrants arrived at John Wayne Airport on Saturday for an emotional reunion with relatives from El Toro.

“They were worried that they might not be allowed to leave the country,” said Ari Khagi, 29, a local engineer who greeted his maternal grandparents and aunt and uncle at the airport. Khagi himself emigrated from the Soviet Union only two years ago, along with his wife, two children and parents.

“It was tense for a few days,” Khagi said of his arriving relatives’ ordeal. “They were afraid while the coup was going on.”

But the relatives--Khagi’s grandfather Joshua Abramov, 80; grandmother, Anna, 78; and Khagi’s aunt, Tamara Shaklmurov, 50; and her husband, Alex Shaklmurov, 52--looked as if they had taken the momentous events of last week in stride. They were all smiling and said they were happy to be in America where “everyone is so friendly and everything always seems to be on time.”

The relatives’ arduous journey began Monday when they caught the last plane out of their Soviet hometown of Tashkent. By the time they arrived in Moscow 3 1/2 hours later, a right-wing coup had ousted President Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

For many Jewish immigrants waiting to leave the Soviet Union, the coup signaled what could have been the end of any Jewish exodus. The Abramovs and Shaklmurovs had spent the last year planning the move and getting all their paper work in order. They sold most of their belongings except what they could bring on the plane and a “few boxes of books that will be shipped later.”

When Khagi and his father, Marc, saw the four arriving relatives at the airport, the reunion was emotional. They had all lived together in Tashkent and had not seen each other in the two years since the Khagis left for America. The Khagis found their way to Orange County, where both Ari and his father went to work for the Brion Corp. as chemical engineers. Now they are helping their family to relocate.

Acting as interpreter, Ari Khagi quoted his aunt, Tamara, as saying they caught a 6 a.m. flight out of Tashkent--located near the Afghanistan border about 3 1/2 hours by air from Moscow--just before the airport shut down because of the political upheaval.

“When we arrived in Moscow and left the airport for our hotel, the bus driver said he was late because a coup had just begun an hour before,” she said. “We were surprised because everything seemed quiet when we left Tashkent. If the coup had lasted a couple more days it could have been a problem for us.”

The overthrow failed and Gorbachev was back in power when they boarded their jetliner for New York. They missed a connecting flight Friday in New York, but Saturday they were on a plane to John Wayne Airport.

Anna Abramov, being pushed in a wheelchair, appeared the most tired of the group after the long journey. She flinched with surprise at the news that President Gorbachev had resigned as chief of the Communist Party and urged the party leadership to disband the institution that has ruled Soviet life for 74 years.

“She was very surprised. She was on the airplane and did not know what had happened,” Ari Khagi said. “She is hoping there will be something better than the Communist party. She said that party didn’t work.”

Khagi added: “It should have been done away with a long time ago.”

As they did in Tashkent, the family will live in close quarters, in an apartment complex on Canada Road in El Toro. An apartment was ready for the family members who just arrived from the Soviet Union.

Asked about their good fortune in getting out of the Soviet Union, Ari Khagi said, “They are just lucky people.” He added, “And we are lucky to have them here.”

Times staff writer Kristina Lindgren contributed to this story.