After more than two unthinkably. As a result, they brought only a three-day supply of meat. 'Alive': Uruguay Plane Crash Survivors Savor Life 50 Years On But the hard part was not over for Eduardo Strauch. Plane crash victim recounts the desperation that led him to eat friends for survival . The plane slammed into a mountainside in rough weather when the pilot veered off-course. 'Alive': Uruguay plane crash survivors savor life 50 years on I was very young. Their story became the basis of a best-selling book and Hollywood film. They had no food, no water, no clothes bar those scattered about the wrecked fuselage, and even less hope. Without His consent, I felt I would be violating the memory of my friends; that I would be stealing their souls. They had hiked about 38km (24mi) over 10 days. He had brought the pilot's flight chart and guided the helicopters up the mountain to the location of the remaining survivors. However, given the circumstances, including that the bodies were in Argentina, the Chilean rescuers left the bodies at the site until authorities could make the necessary decisions. Of the 45 people on the flight, only 16 survived in sub-zero temperatures. Three passengers, the navigator, and the steward were lost with the tail section. pp. 'Alive' is thunderous entertainment: I know the events by rote, nonetheless I found it electric. The survivors tried to use lipstick recovered from the luggage to write an SOS on the roof of the aircraft, but they quit after realizing that they lacked enough lipstick to make letters visible from the air. On the second night of the expedition, which was their first night sleeping outside, they nearly froze to death. The film explores the true story of the Uruguayan rugby team whose plane crashed in the Andes in 1972. Survive! (1976) - IMDb The climb was very slow; the survivors at the fuselage watched them climb for three days. Vizintn and Parrado rejoined Canessa where they had slept the night before. [17], It was still bitterly cold, but the sleeping bag allowed them to live through the nights. Enrique Platero had a piece of metal stuck in his abdomen that when removed brought a few inches of intestine with it, but he immediately began helping others. [17], On 12 December 1972, Parrado, Canessa, and Vizintn, lacking mountaineering gear of any kind, began to climb the glacier at 3,570 metres (11,710ft) to the 4,670 metres (15,320ft) peak blocking their way west. NPR's Lulu Garcia-Navarro speaks with him about his story of hope in his book, Out of the Silence: After. He gained the summit of the 4,650 metres (15,260ft) high peak before Vizintn. They had no technical gear, no map or compass, and no climbing experience. Pilot Ferradas died instantly when the nose gear compressed the instrument panel against his chest, forcing his head out of the window; co-pilot Lagurara was critically injured and trapped in the crushed cockpit. Canessa said it was the worst night of his life. Condemned to die without any hope we transported the rugby feeling to the cold fuselage at 12,000ft.". Had we turned into brute savages? While some reports state the pilot incorrectly estimated his position using dead reckoning, the pilot was relying on radio navigation. Because of the co-pilot's dying statement that the aircraft had passed Curic, the group believed the Chilean countryside was just a few kilometres away to the west. [15], They continued east the next morning. "I think the greatest sadness I felt in my life was when I had to eat a dead body," said Roberto Canessa, 59, who was a medical student at the time of the crash. Fairly early on, you say that hearing your cousin Adolfo say out loud what many were thinking - that you were going to have to eat the bodies - gave you a kind of relief. On 26 December, two pictures taken by members of Cuerpo de Socorro Andino (Andean Relief Corps) of a half-eaten human leg were printed on the front page of two Chilean newspapers, El Mercurio and La Tercera de la Hora,[2] who reported that all survivors resorted to cannibalism. [31], Sergio Cataln, a Chilean arriero (muleteer), read the note and gave them a sign that he understood. The aircraft carried 40 passengers and five crew members. We wondered whether we were going mad even to contemplate such a thing. And at the end - absolutely disconnected with the origin of that food. The True Story Behind a Rugby Team's Plane Crash In the Andes [16] The remaining 27 faced severe difficulties surviving the nights when temperatures dropped to 30C (22F). Several members of a Uruguayan rugby team who survived that disaster - which came to known as the 'Miracle of the Andes' - met up on the 40th anniversary of the crash, in 2012, to play a . GARCIA-NAVARRO: Strauch finally decided to tell his story publicly after a mountaineer discovered his jacket and wallet at the crash site years later and returned it to him. Colonel Julio Csar Ferradas was an experienced Air Force pilot who had a total of 5,117 flying hours. They also built a cross in the snow using luggage, but it was unseen by the search and rescue aircraft. Unknown to the people on board, or the rescuers, the flight had crashed about 21km (13mi) from the former Hotel Termas el Sosneado, an abandoned resort and hot springs that might have provided limited shelter.[2]. On the afternoon of October 13, 1972, Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 begins its descent toward Santiago, Chile, too early and crashes high in the Andes Mountains. On October 13, 1972, Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 left the city of Mendoza, Argentina carrying the Old Christians Rugby Club of Montevideo, Uruguay to a scheduled game in Santiago, Chile. They decided instead that it would be more effective to return to the fuselage and disconnect the radio system from the aircraft's frame, take it back to the tail, and connect it to the batteries. Andes Tragedy: 50 years after the plane crash its film will have on He said the experience scarred him but gave him a new-found appreciation for life. 'Alive': Uruguay plane crash survivors savour life 50 years on "At about this time we were falling in the Andes. [18] All had lived near the sea; some of the team members had never seen snow before, and none had experience at high altitude. Along with the 40 on board, there were five crew on the chartered flight on October 13, 1972 Friday the 13th. Cataln threw bread to the men across the river. He has made them human. There were 10 extra seats and the team members invited a few friends and family members to accompany them. [5][6] Once across the mountains in Chile, south of Curic, the aircraft was supposed to turn north and initiate a descent into Pudahuel Airport in Santiago. But could we do it? uruguay rugby team plane crash survivors - Weird Things After some debate the next morning, they decided that it would be wiser to return to the tail, remove the aircraft's batteries, and take them back to the fuselage so they might power up the radio and make an SOS call to Santiago for help.[17]. [2] He asked one of the passengers to find his pistol and shoot him, but the passenger declined. They called on the Andes Rescue Group of Chile (CSA). The plane, traveling from Uruguay to Chile, went down over the Andes moun-tains after on October 13, 1972. We helped many, many cases, and it's really amazing that so much suffering, 47 years later, became something so positive for me and for so many people. [17][26], Gradually, there appeared more and more signs of human presence; first some evidence of camping, and finally on the ninth day, some cows. He scribbled a note, attached it and a pencil to a rock with some string, and threw the message across the river. The story of the 16 survivors of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, which was chartered to take an amateur rugby team from Montevideo to Santiago, Chile, in 1972 was immortalized in the best-selling book, Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors by Piers Paul Read. Returning to the scene of the crash: A survivor of the Uruguayan rugby "The 29 guys that were still alive, abandoned, no food, no rescue, nothing what do you do?" GARCIA-NAVARRO: Of course, the aspect of the story that has gained the most notoriety was the decision you all made that in order to survive, you would have to start eating your dead friends. Editorial ALreves, S.L., Bercelona, Spain, Read, Piers Paul. The other passengers were family and friends of the team, as well as the ve crew . Inside and nearby, they found luggage containing a box of chocolates, three meat patties, a bottle of rum, cigarettes, extra clothes, comic books, and a little medicine. Onboard was an Uruguayan rugby team, along with friends and relatives. The weather on 13 October also affected the flight. And the snow was all over the kerosene of the engines of the plane. Im condemned to tell this story for evermore, just like the Beatles always having to sing Yesterday. Stranded: The Andes Plane Crash Survivors - Independent Lens [3], Of the 45 people on the aircraft, three passengers and two crew members in the tail section were killed when it broke apart: Lt. Ramn Sal Martnez, Orvido Ramrez (plane steward), Gaston Costemalle, Alejo Houni, and Guido Magri. They dried the meat in the sun, which made it more palatable. They improvised in other ways. He believes that rugby saved their lives. Then we realized that by folding the quilt in half and stitching the seams together, we could create an insulated sleeping bag large enough for all three expeditionaries to sleep in. The pilot was able to bring the aircraft nose over the ridge, but at 3:34p.m., the lower part of the tail-cone may have clipped the ridge at 4,200 metres (13,800ft). With Hugo Stiglitz, Norma Lazareno, Luz Mara Aguilar, Fernando Larraaga. View history Miracle in the Andes (in Spanish "Milagro en los Andes") is a 2006 non-fiction account of a rugby team's survival on a glacier in the Andes for 72 days by survivor Nando Parrado and co-author Vince Rause. Canessa agreed. The ight carried forty-ve passengers, including f-teen members of the Old Christians Rugby team. [4], The last remaining survivors were rescued on 23 December 1972, more than two months after the crash. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. 1972 Uruguayan Plane crash survivor recalls turning into - NEWS We have to get out from here quickly and we don't know how. "If I had been told: 'I'm going to leave you in a mountain 4,000m high, 20C below zero (-4F) in shirtsleeves,' I would have said: I last 10 minutes.' The team's. 'Alive' survivors remember resorting to cannibalism 50 years after crash Andes plane crash survivors mark 40th anniversary with rugby game Parrado finally persuaded Canessa to set out, and joined by Vizintn, the three men took to the mountain on 12 December. All rights reserved. When the tail-cone was detached, it took with it the rear portion of the fuselage, including two rows of seats in the rear section of the passenger cabin, the galley, baggage hold, vertical stabilizer, and horizontal stabilizers, leaving a gaping hole in the rear of the fuselage.