Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571

A Fairchild FH-227D, with Flight 571's Fuerza Aérea Uruguaya livery, used in the 1993 movie Alive
Accident
Date	13 October 1972 – 23 December 1972
Summary	Controlled flight into terrain due to pilot error, 72-day survival
Site	Remote Andes in Malargüe Department, Mendoza Province, Argentina, near the border with Chile at an altitude of 3,570 m (11,710 ft) 34°45′53.5″S 70°17′06.6″W / 34.764861°S 70.285167°W / -34.764861; -70.285167
Aircraft
Aircraft type	Fairchild FH-227D
Operator	Uruguayan Air Force
Registration	T-571
Flight origin	Carrasco International Airport Montevideo, Uruguay
Stopover	Mendoza International Airport
Destination	Pudahuel Airport Santiago, Chile
Passengers	40
Crew	5
Fatalities	29 (12 initially)
Survivors	16 (33 initially)

Crash site

Santiago

Montevideo

Mendoza

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Location of the crash site in Argentina

Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 was the chartered flight of a Fairchild FH-227D from Montevideo, Uruguay, to Santiago, Chile, that crashed in the Andes mountains on October 13, 1972. The accident and subsequent survival became known as the Andes flight disaster (Tragedia de los Andes) and the Miracle of the Andes (Milagro de los Andes).

The inexperienced co-pilot, Lieutenant-Colonel Dante Héctor Lagurara, was the pilot flying at the time of the accident. He mistakenly believed the aircraft had overflown Curicó, the turning point to fly north and begin descending into Pudahuel Airport Santiago de Chile, but failed to notice that instrument readings indicated he was still 60–70 km (37–43 mi) East of the city. As he began to descend, the aircraft struck a mountain, shearing off both wings and the tail cone. The remaining portion of the fuselage slid down a glacier at an estimated 350 km/h (220 mph) and descended about 725 metres (2,379 ft) before coming to a stop at the foot of an ice and snow mound.

The flight was carrying 45 passengers and crew, including 19 members of the Old Christians Club rugby union team, along with their families, supporters and friends. Three crew members and nine passengers died immediately and several more died soon after due to the frigid temperatures and the severity of their injuries. The wreck is located at an elevation of 3,570 metres (11,710 ft), in the remote Andes mountains of western Argentina, just east of the border with Chile. Authorities flew over the crash site several times during the following days, searching for the aircraft, but could not glimpse the white fuselage against the snow. Search efforts were called-off after eight days of searching.^[1]

During 72 days after the crash the survivors suffered from extreme hardships, including exposure, starvation and several avalanches, which led to the deaths of 13 more passengers. The remaining passengers resorted to cannibalism to survive. As the weather improved with the arrival of late spring, two survivors, Nando Parrado and Roberto Canessa, climbed the 4,650-metre (15,260 ft) mountain peak on the western rim of the glacier cirque without any mountaineering gear whatsoever and hiked for 10 days into Chile to seek help, traveling 61 km (38 miles). On 23 December 1972, two months after the crash, all 16 remaining survivors were rescued. The news of their miraculous survival drew worldwide headlines and evolved into a media circus.

Flight and accident

Flight origin

Members of the amateur Old Christians Club rugby union team from Montevideo, Uruguay, were scheduled to play a match in Santiago, Chile, against the Old Boys Club, an English rugby team.^[2] Club president Daniel Juan chartered a Uruguayan Air Force twin turboprop Fairchild FH-227D turbo-prop airplane to fly the team over the Andes mountains to Santiago. The aircraft carried 40 passengers and 5 crew members. The pilot in command, Colonel Julio César Ferradas, was an experienced Air Force pilot with 5,117 hours of flight time. He was accompanied by co-pilot Lieutenant-Colonel Dante Héctor Lagurara. There were ten extra seats, so the team invited friends and family members to accompany them. When someone cancelled at the last minute, Graziela Mariani purchased a ticket so she could attend her oldest daughter's wedding.^[2]

The aircraft departed Carrasco International Airport on 12 October 1972, but a stormfront over the Andes forced them to stop overnight in Mendoza, Argentina. Although there is a direct westerly route from Mendoza to Santiago, the high mountains with peaks of 25,000 to 26,000 feet (7,600 to 7,900 m), are almost at the limit of the FH-227D's maximum operational ceiling of 28,000 feet (8,500 m). With the aircraft loaded to capacity, this direct route would have required the pilot to steer his aircraft very carefully to avoid the mountains. Instead, it was customary for this type of aircraft to fly a longer 600-kilometre (370 mi), 90-minute U-shaped route^[2] route from Mendoza to the South to Malargüe using the A7 airway (known today as UW44), then west along the G-17 (UB684) airway, crossing Planchón pass to the Curicó radiobeacon in Chile, and from there north to land in Santiago.^[3][4]

The weather on 13 October also affected the flight adversley. On the morning of the flight meteorological conditions over the Andes had not improved but changes were expected by the early afternoon. The pilot delayed the flight and took off from Mendoza at 2:18 p.m. on Friday 13 October. He flew south towards the Malargüe radiobeacon at flight level 180 (FL180, 18,000 feet (5,500 m)). Lagurara radioed their position to Malargüe Airport and told them they would cross the 2,515 metres (8,251 ft) high Planchón pass at 3:21 p.m. Planchón pass is the air traffic control hand-off point between Chile and Argentina.^[5][6] After crossing the Andes into Chile the aircraft was supposed to turn north and descend into Pudahuel Airport in Santiago.

The Crash

Map of the flight^[3]

Pilot Ferradas had previously flown across the Andes 29 times. On this flight he was training co-pilot Lagurara, who was at the controls. As they flew through the Andes, clouds obscured the mountains.^[7][3] The aircraft was four years old and had 792 hours on the airframe.^[8] The aircraft was regarded by some pilots as underpowered and was nicknamed by them the "lead-sled".^[9][10]

Due to cloud cover the pilots were flying under instrument meteorological conditions at an altitude of 18,000 feet (5,500 m) (FL180) and could not visually confirm their location. While some reports state the co-pilot incorrectly estimated his position using dead reckoning, he was relying on radio navigation.^[10] The aircraft's VOR/DME navigation radio showed the bearing and distance to the Curicó radio beacon, 60–70 km (37–43 mi) west of Planchon pass.

At 3:21 p.m. shortly after crossing Planchon pass, Lagurara notified air traffic controllers that he expected to reach Curicó a minute later. The flight time from Planchon pass to Curicó is normally 11 minutes, but only three minutes later the co-pilot told Santiago that they were passing Curicó and turning north. He requested permission from air traffic control to descend. The controller, unaware the flight was still over the Andes due to a lack of radar coverage, authorized him to descend to 11,500 feet (3,500 m) (FL115).^[7][10].^[3]

As the aircraft descended, severe turbulence tossed the aircraft around. Nando Parrado recalled that a downdraft made the plane descend several hundred feet and out of the clouds. The rugby players at first joked about the turbulence until passengers saw that the aircraft was too close to the mountains. "That was probably the moment when the pilots saw the black ridge rising dead ahead."^[11]

Roberto Canessa later said that thought the pilot turned north too soon and began the descent to Santiago while the aircraft was still flying over the Andes. Then "he began to climb, until the plane was nearly vertical and it began to stall and shake."^[12] The aircraft's ground collision alarm sounded and scared all the passengers.^[4]

The co-pilot applied maximum power to gain altitude to cross the 4,200 metres (13,800 ft) high ridge. Witness accounts and evidence at the scene indicated the plane struck the mountain either two or three times. At 3:34 p.m. the nose of the aircraft made it over the ridge while the tail-cone clipped the ridge and separated from the fuselage. The right wing was also severed. As the tail-cone detached it took the rear section of the fuselage with it along with two rows of seats, the galley, baggage hold, vertical stabilizer and horizontal stabilizers, leaving a gaping hole in the rear of the fuselage. Three passengers, the navigator and the steward were lost with the tail section.^[3][2]

The aircraft continued forward and up another 200 meters (660 ft) for a few more seconds when an outcropping at 4,400 meters (14,400 ft) tore off the left wing. The left propeller sliced through the fuselage as the wing was severed.^[3] Two more passengers fell out of the rear end of the fuselage at that point. The front part of the fuselage flew straight through the air before careening down 725 metres (2,379 ft) along the steep glacier at 350 km/h (220 mph) like a high-speed bobsled. Then fuselage came to a stop ater colliding with a snow bank. The seats were torn from the floor and were thrown against the forward bulkhead. The impact buchled the nose crushing the cockpit with the two pilots inside and killing Ferradas immediately.^[13]

The official investigation concluded that the crash was caused by controlled flight into terrain due to pilot error.^[5][14]

The plane's fuselage came to rest in the cirque of a glacier at 34°45′53.5″S 70°17′06.6″W / 34.764861°S 70.285167°W / -34.764861; -70.285167 at an elevation of 3,570 metres (11,710 ft) in the Malargüe Department's Valley of Tears in Mendoza Province, Argentina. The unnamed glacier (later named Glaciar de las Lágrimas or Glacier of Tears) lies between mount Sosneado and 4,280 metres (14,040 ft) high Tinguiririca volcano, straddling the remote mountainous border between Chile and Argentina. It is south of the 4,650 metres (15,260 ft) high Mount Seler, the mountain the survivors later climbed and which Nando Parrado named after his father. The aircraft came to rest 80 km (50 mi) to the east of its planned route.^[3]

Crash aftermath

Of the 45 people on the aircraft, three passengers and two crew members in the tail section were killed when it broke off: Lt. Ramón Saúl Martínez (navigator), Orvido Ramírez (steward), Gaston Costemalle, Alejo Hounié and Guido Magri. A few seconds later, Daniel Shaw and Carlos Valeta fell out of the rear fuselage killing Shaw immediately. Valeta survived the fall, but stumbled down the snow-covered glacier, fell into deep snow and asphyxiated.^[2] His body was found by fellow passengers on 14 December.^[15][16]

At least four died when the fuselage impacted the snow bank, causing the remaining seats to break loose from the floor and piled-up against the front of the fuselage: Team physician Dr. Francisco Nicola and his wife Esther Nicola; Eugenia Parrado and Fernando Vazquez (medical student). Pilot Ferradas died instantly when the nose gear pressed the instrument panel against his chest, forcing his head out of the windshield; co-pilot Lagurara was critically injured and trapped in the crushed cockpit and died the next day.^[2] He asked one of the passengers to find his pistol and shoot him, but the passenger refused to do so.^[4]

Thirty-three remained alive. Many were critically or seriously injured, with wounds including broken legs from the aircraft seats breaking loose and piling-up against the forward bulkhead.^[16] Canessa and Gustavo Zerbino, both medical students, quickly triaged the wounded and treated those they could help most. Parrado's skull had fractured and he remained comatose for three days. When a piece of metal piercing Enrique Platero's abdomen was removed, it brought out a few inches of hisstomach with it. Even so he immediately began helping others. Both of Arturo Nogueira's legs were broken in several places. None of the passengers with compound fractures survived.^[17]

Search and rescue

The Chilean Air Search and Rescue Service (SARS) was notified within the hour that the flight was missing. Four planes searched that afternoon until dark. News of the missing flight reached Uruguayan media around 6:00 p.m. in the evening. SARS officers listened to radio transmissions and concluded the aircraft had come down in one of the most remote and inaccessible areas of the Andes and called upon the Andes Rescue Group of Chile (CSA). Unknown to the people on board, or even the rescuers, the flight had crashed in Argentina about 21 km (13 mi) from the former Hotel Termas El Sosneado, an abandoned hot springs resort that might have provided limited shelter with warmer temperatures due to the lower altitude.^[2]

On the second day 11 aircraft from Argentina, Chile and Uruguay searched for the missing flight.^[2] The search area covered the accident location and a few aircraft even overflew the crash site. The survivors tried to use lipstick recovered from their luggage to write an SOS message on the fuselage of the aircraft, but didn't have enough lipstick to make the letters large enough to be visible from the air. They also placed luggage on the snow in the shape of a cross, but the cross was never spotted by the search and rescue aircraft.^[15] They saw three aircraft fly overhead, but were unable to attract their attention and none of the aircraft crews were able to spot the white fuselage against the snow.

The harsh conditions gave searchers little hope that they would find anyone alive. Rescue efforts were cancelled after eight days of searching.^[17] On 21 October, after searching for more than 142 hours the searchers concluded that the chances of survival were nil and terminated the search. They planned to resume the search for the victims in December after the snow melted.

First week of survival

Five more people died during the first night: The co-pilot Lagurara, Francisco Abal, Graziela Mariani, Felipe Maquirriain and Julio Martinez-Lamas.

The 28 surviving passengers removed the broken seats and other debris from the aircraft to fashion a crude shelter. They all crammed into the broken fuselage in a space about 2.5 by 3 metres (8 ft 2 in × 9 ft 10 in). They used luggage, seats and snow to close off the open end of the fuselage to stay warm. Fito Strauch devised a solar-powered water collector with sheet metal retrieved from under the seats. To prevent snow blindness, he improvised sunglasses with plastic from the sun visors in the cockpit and sowed the plastic to a bra strap with electrical wire. They used seat covers made of wool to keep warm and seat cushions as snowshoes. The captain of the rugby team, Marcelo Perez, became the leader of the survivors.^[15][17]

After three days Parrado woke from his coma and found out his mother had died and his 19-year-old sister Susana was severely injured. He attempted to keep her alive but on the eighth day she died from her injuries.^[16] The remaining 27 survivors had a hard time during the night when temperatures dropped to −30 °C (−22 °F).^[18] All the survivors had lived their entire lives by the sea and some had never even seen snow before. None had survival experience at high altitudes. They lacked medical supplies, cold-weather clothing, equipment and food and they all had only three pairs of sunglasses to keep them from going snow-blind.

The survivors found a small AM transistor radio jammed between seats on the aircraft. Roy Harley improvised a long antenna using electrical cable from the plane^[4] and on the eleventh day on the mountain heard the news that the search had been called-off. Piers Paul Read's book Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors describes the moments after this discovery:

The others who had clustered around Roy, upon hearing the news, began to sob and pray, all except Parrado, who looked calmly up at the mountains which rose to the west. Gustavo Nicolich came out of the aircraft and, seeing their faces, knew what they had heard… climbed through the hole in the wall of suitcases and rugby shirts, crouched at the mouth of the dim tunnel, and looked at the mournful faces which were turned towards him. 'Hey boys,' he shouted, 'there's some good news! We just heard on the radio. They've called off the search.' Inside the crowded aircraft there was silence. As the hopelessness of their predicament enveloped them, they wept. 'Why the hell is that good news?' Paez shouted angrily at Nicolich. 'Because it means,' said, 'that we're going to get out of here on our own.' The courage of this one man prevented a flood of total despair from overcoming the group.^[19]

Cannibalism

The survivors had very little food: All told they managed to scrounge together eight chocolate bars, three small jars of jam, a tin of mussels, a tin of almonds, a few dates, some candy, dried plums and several bottles of wine and even though they rationed the food, it only lasted for a week. Parrado only ate a single chocolate-covered peanut in three days.^[17][2] Even with their strict rationing, the food supply dwindled quickly. There was no natural vegetation and no animals anywhere in sight. When the food ran out they became ill because they tried to eat the cotton stuffing inside the seats and leather belts and shoes.^[17]

Knowing that rescue efforts had been called off and facing death from starvation, the survivors gave each other permission to use their bodies for food in case they died. Left with no alternatives, the survivors consumed the bodies of their deceased friends.^[15][17] Canessa later described the decision to eat the dead:

Our common goal was to survive – but what we lacked was food. We had long since run out of the meager pickings we'd found on the plane, and there was no vegetation or animal life to be found. After just a few days, we were feeling the sensation of our own bodies consuming themselves just to remain alive. Before long we would become too weak to recover from starvation.

We knew the answer, but the answer was just too terrifying to contemplate.

The bodies of our friends and team-mates, preserved outside in the snow and ice, contained vital, life-preserving proteins that would keep us alive. But could we do it? For a long time, we agonized. I went out in the snow and prayed to God for guidance. Without His consent, I felt I would be violating the memory of my friends; that I would be stealing their souls.

We wondered whether we were going mad to even contemplate such a deed. Had we turned into brute savages? Or was this the only alternative for us to survive? Truly, we were pushing the limits of our fear.^[20]

The group survived by eating the bodies of their dead comrades. This decision was not taken lightly, as most of the dead were classmates, close friends or relatives. Canessa cut the meat with a shard of broken windshield glass. He set the example by swallowing the first matchstick-sized strip of frozen flesh. Later on, several others followed suit. The next day, even more survivors ate the meat offered to them, but a few still refused to do so or could not swallow the life-saving protein.^[2]

In his memoir, Miracle in the Andes: 72 Days on the Mountain and My Long Trek Home (2006), Parrado wrote about this decision:

At high altitude, the body's caloric needs are astronomical… we were starving in earnest, with no hope of finding food, but our hunger soon grew so voracious that we searched anyway… again and again, we scoured the fuselage in search of crumbs and morsels. We tried to eat strips of leather torn from pieces of luggage, though we knew that the chemicals they'd been treated with would do us more harm than good. We ripped open seat cushions hoping to find straw, but found only inedible upholstery foam… Again and again, I came to the same conclusion: unless we wanted to eat the clothes we were wearing, there was nothing here but aluminum, plastic, ice, and rock.^{[21]: 94–95}

Parrado protected the bodies of his mother and sister and they were never eaten. They dried the meat in the sun, which made eating it more palatable. They were initially so revolted by the experience that they could eat only skin, muscle and fat. When there was no more flesh to eat they ate hearts, lungs and even their brains.^[21]

All of the passengers were Roman Catholic. Some feared eternal damnation. According to Read, some rationalized the act of cannibalism as equivalent to the Eucharist, the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ under the appearances of bread and wine. Others justified it according to a Bible verse found in John 15:13: 'No man hath greater love than this: That he lay down his life for his friends.'

In the end, all who survived made the decision to eat the bodies, though not without reservations. Javier Methol and his wife Liliana, the only surviving female passenger, were the last to eat human flesh. She had strong religious convictions, and only reluctantly agreed to eat human flesh after she was told to view the act "like the Holy Communion".^[22][23]

First Avalanche

Close to midnight on 29 October and seventeen days after the crash, an avalanche struck the fuselage while the survivors were sleeping. The avalanche filled the fuselage with snow and ice and smothered eight people to death: Enrique Platero, Liliana Methol, Gustavo Nicolich, Daniel Maspons, Juan Menendez, Diego Storm, Carlos Roque and Marcelo Perez. The death of Perez, the team captain and leader of the survivors, along with the loss of Liliana Methol, who had nursed the survivors "like a mother and a saint", were particularly difficult to bear for the remaining survivors.^[16][22]

The avalanche completely buried the fuselage and filled it to within 1 metre (3 ft 3 in) of the ceiling. The survivors trapped inside quickly realized they would soon run out of air. Parrado took a metal pole from the luggage racks and pried open one of the cockpit windscreens and proceeded to poke a hole through the snow to provide a source of ventilation.^[24][25] On the morning of 31 October with considerable difficulty they were able to dig a tunnel from the cockpit to the surface, only to encounter a furious blizzard that made them stay inside the fuselage.

For three days the survivors were trapped in the extremely cramped space within the buried fuselage with about 1 metre (3 ft 3 in) headroom, together with the bodies of the deceased. On the third day they began to eat the flesh of their recently deceased friends. Parrado later said, "It was soft and greasy, streaked with blood and bits of wet cartilage. I gagged hard when I placed it in my mouth."^[16][17]

With Perez dead, three men–Daniel Fernández and cousins Eduardo and Fito Strauch–assumed the leadership of the group. They took over harvesting flesh from the deceased and distributing it for others to eat.^[15]

Before the avalanche a few insisted the only way to survive would be to climb over the mountains and search for help. Because before he died the co-pilot kept repeating that the aircraft had overflown Curicó, the group believed the Chilean countryside was just a few kilometres to the west. Alas, they were actually more than 89 km (55 mi) to the east, deep in the Andes mountain range. The snow that had buried the fuselage gradually melted with the advent of summer. In the first weeks after the crash some survivors made brief expeditions in the immediate vicinity of the aircraft but they found that altitude sickness, dehydration, snow blindness, malnourishment and the extreme night-time cold made traveling any significant distance from the wreck an impossible task.^[7]

Expedition to explore the crash area

They all decided that a few survivors should leave to seek help. Several survivors were determined to join the expedition team, including Canessa, one of the two medical students, but others were less willing to do so or were unsure of their ability to stand up to such a physically demanding ordeal. Numa Turcatti and Antonio Vizintin were picked to accompany Canessa and Parrado; however, Turcatti's leg bruise had become infected, so he was unable to join the expedition. Canessa, Parrado and Vizintín were among the strongest of the lot and were allocated larger rations of meat and the warmest clothes.^[15] They were also excused from carrying out the daily routine of tasks essential to the group's survival so they could train for the upcoming ordeal instead. At Canessa's urging, they waited nearly a week for temperatures to increase.

The expedition aimed to head west to Chile but the large mountain on the western rim of the glacier's cirque presented a formidable obstacle, thus the team of three first tried to head to the east. They hoped the valley would make a U-turn to the west that would lead them to Chile. On 15 November after several hours of walking east they found the tail section of the aircraft largely intact with the galley about 1.6 km (1 mi) to the east and downhill of the fuselage. They also found luggage containing a box of chocolates, three meat patties, a bottle of rum, cigarettes, extra clothes, comic books, some medicine and, most importantly, the aircraft's radio. The group decided to spend the night inside the tail section and built a fire and stayed up late reading comic books.^[15]

The next morning they continued to the east. On the second night of the expedition they nearly froze to death. The next morning they decided that it would be better to return to the tail, remove the aircraft's batteries, and take them back to the fuselage and try to power-up the radio to make an SOS call to Santiago for help.^[17]

Radio inoperative

Alas the trio found that the 24-kilogram (53 lb) batteries were too heavy to take back to the fuselage, an uphill climb in the snow from the tail section. Instead they decided it would be better to return to the fuselage, disconnect the radio in the cockpit and take it back to the tail to connect it to the batteries. One of the team members, Roy Harley, used his knowledge as an amateur electronics enthusiast to assist. Unbeknownst to them, the aircraft's avionics relied on 115 volts AC for power while the battery from the tail section supplied 24 volts DC,^[4] thus dooming their plan to failure.

After several days of not being able to make the radio work, they gave up and returned to the fuselage realizing they would have to climb out of the mountains on their own terms if they were to have any chance of being rescued. They were struck by another blizzard while returning to the fuselage and Harley wanted to just give-up and die but Parrado would not let him do so and helped him back to the fuselage.^[15]

Three more deaths

On 15 November, Arturo Nogueira died, and three days later, Rafael Echavarren died, both from their infected wounds. Numa Turcatti, whose extreme revulsion against eating human flesh dramatically accelerated his physical decline, died on day 60 (11 December) weighing only 25 kg (55 pounds). The remaining survivors knew they would all die if they din't go out to find help soon.^[17] The survivors heard on the transistor radio that the Uruguayan Air Force had resumed searching for them.^[26]

Expedition to Chile to get help

Making a sleeping bag

The remaining survivors now came to the realization that the only way out was to climb over the mountains on the west rim of the glacier's cirque, and that such a trek was impossible unless they found a way to survive the freezing night-time temperatures. They used insulation from the rear of the fuselage, copper wire and the waterproof fabric that covered the plane's air conditioning unit to fashion a sleeping bag.^[18][17] Parrado described in his book, Miracle in the Andes: 72 Days on the Mountain and My Long Trek Home, how they came up with the idea of making a sleeping bag:

The second challenge would be to protect ourselves from exposure, especially after sundown. At this time of year, we could expect daytime temperatures well above freezing, but the nights were still cold enough to kill us, and we knew now that we couldn't expect to find shelter on the open slopes.

We needed a way to survive the long nights without freezing, and the quilted insulation we'd taken from the tail section gave us our solution ... as we brainstormed about the upcoming trip, we realized we could sew the patches together to create a large warm quilt. 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. With the warmth of three bodies trapped by the insulation we might be able to survive the coldest nights.

Carlitos took on the challenge. His mother had taught him to sew when he was a boy, and with the needles and thread from the sewing kit found in his mother's cosmetic case, he began to work ... to speed the progress, Carlitos taught others to sew, and we all took our turns ... Coche , Gustavo , and Fito turned out to be our best and fastest tailors.^[21]

Turcatti died after the sleeping bag was completed. Canessa was still hesitant about the trip. While the others encouraged Parrado, no one actually volunteered to go with him. Parrado finally persuaded Canessa to set out and together with Vizintín, the three expeditionaries took to the mountain on 12 December.^[17]

Climbing the peak

Without any mountaineering gear at all, on 12 December 1972 Parrado, Canessa and Vizintín began climbing the glacier at an altitude of 3,570 metres (11,710 ft) aiming for the 4,670 metres (15,320 ft) west ridge of the glacier's cirque blocking their way to the west. They managed to cross the ridge and then descended and trekked for over ten days, traveling 61 km (38 miles)^[27][28] to seek help.^[17] Based on the aircraft's altimeter, they thought they were at 7,000 feet (2,100 m), when they were actually at about 11,800 feet (3,597 m). Given the pilot's dying statement that they had overflown Curicó, they estimated they were near the western edge of the Andes and that therefore the closest help lay to the west. As a result, they only brought along a three-day supply of meat for the three of them.^[26]

Parrado wore three pairs of jeans and three sweaters over a polo shirt. He wore four pairs of socks wrapped in a plastic shopping bag. They had no technical gear, no map, no compass and no climbing experience. Instead of climbing the ridge to the west, which was somewhat lower than the peak, they climbed straight up the steep mountain.^[29] They estimated they would reach the peak in only one day. Parrado took the lead and the other two often had to ask him to slow down. The thin oxygen-poor air made climbing difficult for all of them. During certain sections of the climb they sank up to their hips in the summer-softened snow.^[17]

Their home-brewed sleeping bag kept them alive through the frigid nights. In the documentary film Stranded, Canessa described how they had difficulty finding a level place for the sleeping bag on the first night of their ascent. A blizzard blew fiercely and they finally found a rock ledge at the edge of a cliff. Canessa said it was the worst night of his life. The climb was very slow. The survivors at the base camp watched them climb for three long days. On the second day, Canessa thought he saw a road to the east, and tried to persuade Parrado to head in that direction but Parrado disagreed and they argued without reaching an agreement.^[26]

On the third morning of the trek, Canessa stayed at their camp. Vizintín and Parrado reached the base of a near-vertical wall more than one hundred meters (300 feet) tall covered in snow and ice. Parrado was determined to hike out or die trying. He used a stick from his pack to carve steps in the wall. He gained the summit of the 4,650 metres (15,260 ft) high peak before Vizintín. Believing he would see the green valleys of Chile to the west, he was stunned to see an unending number of snowy mountain peaks in every direction. They had climbed a mountain on the border between Argentina and Chile meaning the expeditionaries were still tens of kilometres from the green valleys of Chile. Vizintín and Parrado rejoined Canessa where they had slept the night before. At sunset, while sipping cognac from a bottle they had found in the remains of the tail section, Parrado said: "Roberto, can you imagine how beautiful this would be if we were not walking dead?"^[29]

The next morning they realized their rescue-seeking expedition was going to take much longer than they had originally planned. As they were running low on food, Vizintín offered to return to the base camp so the other two would have enough food to complete their journey. The return was entirely downhill and he arrived back at the crash site in an hour by using an aircraft seat as a makeshift sleigh.^[26]

Parrado and Canessa took three hours to climb to the summit. When Canessa reached the top and saw nothing but snow-capped mountains for kilometres around them, his first thought was: "We're dead."^[17] Parrado saw two smaller peaks on the western horizon that were not covered in snow. The valley at the base of their mountain wound its way towards those peaks. Parrado was sure this was the way out of the mountains and refused to give up hope. Canessa agreed to go west with him. Only much later did Canessa learn that the road he saw to the east was easier and would have gotten them to rescue sooner.^[29][30]

While on the summit Parrado told Canessa: "We may be walking to our deaths, but I would rather walk to meet my death than wait for it to come to me." Canessa agreed. "You and I are friends, Nando. We have been through so much. Now let's go die together."^[29] They followed the ridge towards the valley for a considerable distance while they descended.

Finding help

Parrado and Canessa hiked for seven more days. They reached the narrow valley that Parrado had seen from the top of the mountain, where they found the source of the San José river, an affluent of the Portillo river, in turn an affluent of the Azufre river near the village of Los Maitenes. They continued along the river and reached the snowline.^[17][26] Gradually there appeared ever more signs of human life: First evidence of a campsite and finally on the ninth day a few cows.

When they rested that evening they were very tired, and Canessa seemed unable to go on.^{[citation needed]} As they gathered wood to build a fire, they saw three men on horseback on the other side of the river. Parrado called out to them but the sound of the river made it impossible for them to communicate. One of the men across the river saw Parrado and Canessa and shouted back: "Tomorrow!" The next day the man returned. He scribbled a note, bound it together with a pencil with some string to a stone and threw the message across the river. Parrado replied:^[17][26]

Vengo de un avión que cayó en las montañas. Soy uruguayo. Hace 10 días que estamos caminando. Tengo un amigo herido arriba. En el avión quedan 14 personas heridas. Tenemos que salir rápido de aquí y no sabemos cómo. No tenemos comida. Estamos débiles. ¿Cuándo nos van a buscar arriba? Por favor, no podemos ni caminar. ¿Dónde estamos?
English: I come from an airplane that crashed in the mountains. I am Uruguayan. We have been walking for 10 days. I have a wounded friend up there. In the plane there are still 14 injured people. We need to get out of here quickly and we don't know how to. We don't have any food. We are weak. When are you going to come to get us? Please, we can't even walk. Where are we?^[31]

Sergio Catalán, a Chilean arriero (muleteer), read the note and gave them a sign that he understood. Catalán spoke with the other two men, and one of them remembered that several weeks ago an acquaintance had asked them if they had heard about the airplane that had crashed in the Andes. The arrieros could not imagine that anyone could still be alive. Catalán threw bread to the expeditioners across the river. He then rode his horse westwards for ten hours to get help.^[17][26]

During the trip he saw another arriero on the south side of the Azufre river and asked him to ride towards the expeditioners and bring them to Los Maitenes. He then followed the river to its junction with the Tinguiririca river, crossed a bridge and followed the narrow route to the holiday resort of Termas del Flaco. There he hailed a truck that took him to the police station at the village of Puente Negro.^[17][26] The police relayed news of the survivors to the Chilean Army command in San Fernando, who in turn contacted Army headquarters in Santiago.

In the meantime Parrado and Canessa were brought to Los Maitenes on horseback where they were fed and allowed to rest. They had hiked about 61 km (38 mi) over ten days.^[17] Since the plane crash, Canessa had lost almost half of his body weight, about 44 kilograms (97 lb).^[32][26]

Helicopter rescueedit

When the news broke of survivors from the crash of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, the story of their 72-day ordeal drew international attention.^[33] A crowd of international reporters walked several kilometers along the route from Puente Negro to Termas del Flaco. The reporters clamored to interview Parrado and Canessa about the crash and how they managed to survive.^[4]

The Chilean Air Force provided three Bell UH-1 helicopters to assist with the rescue. They flew in heavy cloud cover under instrument conditions to Los Maitenes de Curicó, where the Army interviewed Parrado and Canessa. Once the fog lifted at noon, Parrado volunteered to lead the helicopters to the crash site. He had brought along the pilot's map and guided the helicopters up the mountain back to the crash site. One helicopter stayed behind as backup. The pilots were amazed at the difficult terrain the two expeditionaries had managed to cross to get help.^[4]

On the afternoon of 22 December 1972, the two helicopters reached the crash site and the survivors. The steep terrain only permitted the pilot to touch down with a single skid. Due to the weight limits imposed by the altitude, the two helicopters were only able to rescue half the survivors. Four members of the search and rescue team volunteered to stay behind and spend the night with the seven survivors still on the mountain.^[4]

The survivors spent their last night in the fuselage together with the members of the search and rescue party. The rescue helicopters made a second flight the next day and arrived at daybreak. They carried the remaining survivors to hospitals in Santiago for evaluation where they were treated for altitude sickness, dehydration, frostbite, broken bones, scurvy and malnutrition.^[4] The last remaining survivors were rescued on 23 December 1972, more than two months after the crash.^[34]

Normally the search and rescue team would have recovered the remains of the dead for burial. However, given the circumstances, including the fact that the bodies would have been recovered from Argentine soil, the Chilean rescuers decided to leave the bodies behind until argentine authorities decided how to proceed. The Chilean military photographed the bodies and mapped the crash site.^[2]

Aftermathedit

Cannibalism revealededit

After being rescued the survivors initially explained to the press that they had eaten cheese and other food they had with them, and then local plants and herbs. They planned to discuss the details of how they survived, including their cannibalism, in private with their families. False rumors circulated in Montevideo after their rescue that they had killed some of the survivors for food.^[35] On 23 December, news reports of cannibalism were published worldwide, except in Uruguay. 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 to survive.^[36]

The survivors held a press conference on 28 December at Stella Maris College in Montevideo, to tell the story of the events that had unfolded over the past 72 days.^[26] Alfredo Delgado was the spokesman for the survivors. He compared their actions to that of Jesus at the Last Supper, during which he gave his disciples the Eucharist.^[12][37] The survivors initially received a backlash of public opinion, but after they explained the pact the survivors had made amongst themselves to sacrifice their flesh in case of death to help the others survive, the outcry diminished and the families were more understanding.^[19] A Catholic priest heard the survivors' confessions and told them that they were not going to be damned for cannibalism, given the in extremis nature of their survival situation.^[38] The news of their survival and the actions required to live drew world-wide attention and grew into a media circus.^[15]

Remains buried at siteedit

The Argentine authorities and the victims' families decided to bury the remains of the victims at the crash site in a common grave. Thirteen bodies were whole while another 15 consisted mostly of skeletal remains.^[2] Twelve men and a Chilean priest were transported to the crash site on 18 January 1973. Family members were not allowed to attend. They dug a grave about 400 to 800 m (1⁄4 to 1⁄2 mi) from the aircraft fuselage at a site they deemed protected from avalanches.^[2] They built a simple stone altar near the grave and staked an orange iron cross on top of it. They placed a plaque on the pile of rocks with the inscription:^[39]

EL MUNDO A SUS HERMANOS URUGUAYOS
CERCA, OH DIOS DE TI
English: The world to its Uruguayan brothers
Close, oh God, to you

The party doused the remains of the fuselage with gasoline and set them alight. Eduardo Strauch later mentioned in his book Out of the Silence that the bottom half of the fuselage, which was covered in snow and untouched by the fire, was still there during his first visit in 1995.^[40] Ricardo Echavarren, the father of one of the victims, received word from a survivor that his son had wished to be buried at home. Unable to obtain official permission to retrieve his son's body, Echavarren hired guides and mounted an expedition of his own. He had arranged with the priest who had buried his son to mark the bag containing his son's remains. Upon arriving back at the abandoned Hotel Termas El Sosneado with his son's remains, he was arrested for grave robbery. A federal judge and the local mayor intervened to obtain his release, and Echavarren later obtained legal permission to make funeral arrangements for his son.^[2]

Timelineedit

Survivorsedit

• Roberto Canessa* (medical student)
• Nando Parrado*
• Carlos Páez Rodríguez*
• José Pedro Algorta (economics student)
• Alfredo "Pancho" Delgado
• Daniel Fernández
• Roberto "Bobby" François
• Roy Harley*
• José "Coche" Luis Inciarte† ^[41]
• Álvaro Mangino
• Javier Methol†^[42]
• Ramón "Moncho" Sabella
• Adolfo "Fito" Strauch
• Eduardo Strauch
• Antonio "Tintin" Vizintín*
• Gustavo Zerbino (medical student)

* Rugby players

† Survivor since deceased

Legacyedit

The survivors' courage under extremely adverse conditions has been described as "a beacon of hope to their generation, showing what can be accomplished with persistence and determination in the presence of unsurpassable odds, and set our minds to attain a common aim".^[43] The story of the crash is described in the Andes Museum 1972, dedicated in 2013 in Ciudad Vieja, Montevideo.^[44]

In 1973, mothers of 11 of the victims who died in the crash founded the Our Children Library in Uruguay to promote reading and teaching.^[45][46] Family members of victims of the flight founded Fundación Viven in 2006 to preserve the legacy of the flight, memory of the victims and support organ donation.^[46][47]

Every year the crash site continues to attract hundreds of people from all over the world who pay tribute to the victims and survivors and to learn about how they survived.^[48] The trip to the site takes three days. Four-wheel drive vehicles take visitors from the village of El Sosneado to Puesto Araya, near the abandoned Hotel Termas El Sosneado. From there, travelers either ride on horseback or walk for three days to the crash site. They spend their first night in the Valley of Tears at the El Barroso camp site. On the third day, they reach the Las Lágrimas glacier and the crash site.^[48]

In March 2006, the families of those aboard the built a black obelisk monument at the crash site memorializing those who lived and died there.^[49]

In 2007, Chilean arriero Sergio Catalán revealed he had arthrosis of the hip while being interviewed on Chilean television. Canessa, who in between had become a doctor, and other survivors raised the money needed to pay for his hip replacement.^[50] Catalán died on 11 February 2020^[51] at the age of 91.

In popular cultureedit

Over the years, survivors have published books, been portrayed in films and television productions, and produced an official website about the event.

Booksedit

• Blair, Clay Jr. (1973). Survive!. American Heritage Center – Virtual Exhibits. Retrieved 14 October 2012.

• Read, Piers Paul (1974). Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors. Read's book, based on interview of the survivors and their families, was a critical success and remains a highly popular work of non-fiction. Harper published a reprint in 2005, re-titled: Alive: Sixteen Men, Seventy-two Days, and Insurmountable Odds – The Classic Adventure of Survival in the Andes. It includes a revised introduction as well as interviews with Piers Paul Read, Coche Inciarte, and Álvaro Mangino.

• Stephen King (1977). The Shining. King references the crash in his book notoriously set at an isolated hotel in the Rocky Mountains during its harsh winter months. Wendy develops a fear of the hotel's elevator, specifically of being trapped inside with no one else around to save them, and Jack Torrance speculates that "she could see them growing thinner and weaker, starving to death. Or perhaps dining on each other the way those rugby players had."

• Parrado, Nando; Rause, Vince (2006). Miracle in the Andes: 72 Days on the Mountain and My Long Trek Home. Perfection Learning Corporation. ISBN 978-0-7569-8847-0.

• Vierci, Pablo (2023). The Snow Society. Drawing on interviews with each of the 16 survivors 36 years after the crash, journalist and former classmate of many of the survivors Pablo Vierci provides an intimate, collective view of the story in chapters from the perspective of each of the sixteen survivors.

• Canessa, Roberto (2016). I Had to Survive: How a Plane Crash in the Andes Inspired My Calling to Save Lives. In this book, Canessa recalls how the plane crash helped him learn many life lessons about survival, and how his time in the mountains helped renew his motivation to become a doctor.^[52]

• Strauch Urioste, Eduardo; Soriano, Mireya (June 2019). Out of the Silence: After the Crash. Translated by Erikson, Jennie. United States. ISBN 978-1-5420-4295-6.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link) CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)^[53] Four decades after the tragedy, a climber discovered survivor Eduardo Strauch's wallet near the memorialized crash site and returned it to him, a gesture that compelled Strauch to finally "break the silence of the mountains".

• Guiver, John (2022). To Play the Game: A History of Flight 571. Heddon. ISBN 978-1-913166-69-4. A comprehensive history of the Andes tragedy, appearing fifty years after the event. Retells the story both on and off the mountain, giving an in-depth look at the world from which the passengers came, and an analysis of the possible causes of the accident. The book includes detailed accounts of those who died.

Film and televisionedit

• Prisoners of the Snow, a documentary produced by ABC News Studios. Airdate: 22 May 2023.^[54][55]

• Survive! (1976), also known as Supervivientes de los Andes, is a Mexican feature film production directed by René Cardona, Jr.^{[citation needed]} and based on Blair's book, Survive! (1973)^[56]

• The incident is mentioned in the 1978 survival film Cyclone.

• Alive (1993) is a feature film directed by Frank Marshall, narrated by John Malkovich, and starring Ethan Hawke, based on Read's book Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors. Nando Parrado served as a technical adviser to the film.^[57] Eleven of the survivors visited the set during the production.^[58]

• Alive: 20 Years Later (1993) is a documentary film produced, directed, and written by Jill Fullerton-Smith and narrated by Martin Sheen. It explores the lives of the survivors 20 years after the crash and discusses their participation in the production of Alive: The Miracle of the Andes.

• Stranded: I Have Come from a Plane That Crashed on the Mountains (2007), written and directed by Gonzalo Arijón, is a documentary film interlaced with dramatised scenes. All the survivors are interviewed, along with some of their family members and people involved with the rescue operation, and an expedition in which the survivors return to the crash site is documented. The film premiered at the 2007 International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, Netherlands and received the Joris Ivens Award.^[59] This film appeared on PBS Independent Lens as "Stranded: The Andes Plane Crash Survivors" in May 2009.^[60]

• "Trapped: Alive in the Andes" (7 November 2007) is a season 1 episode of the National Geographic Channel documentary television series Trapped. The series examines incidents which left survivors trapped in their situation for a period of time.

• I Am Alive: Surviving the Andes Plane Crash (20 October 2010) is a documentary film directed by Brad Osborne that first aired on the History Channel. The film mixed reenactments with interviews with the survivors and members of the original search teams. Also interviewed were Piers Paul Read, renowned mountain climber Ed Viesturs, Andes Survivors expert and alpinist Ricardo Peña, historians, expert pilots, and high-altitude medical experts.

• The incident is mentioned in a 2011 horror film The Divide.

• The Rick and Morty episode "The Vat of Acid Episode" parodies the events of the crash and the subsequent survival efforts. The number 571 can be seen on the side of the plane.

• In the Rocko's Modern Life episode "Tickled Pinky", Rocko is listing several dangerous activities he and Pinky have engaged in. The last item on the list is "flying over The Andes with a Brazilian soccer team".

• The 2021 Bengali web series Robindronath Ekhane Kawkhono Khete Aashenni loosely portrays the incident.

• The incident was the basis for the Showtime series Yellowjackets.

• The incident is mentioned in the HBO limited series Station Eleven. Episode 7, "Goodbye My Damaged Home".

• Society of the Snow, a feature film about the incident directed by J. A. Bayona, premiered at the 2023 Venice Film Festival. It is Spain's selection for the Best International Feature Film category at the 2024 Academy Awards.^[61]

Stageedit

• The play Sobrevivir a Los Andes (Surviving the Andes) was written by Gabriel Guerrero and premiered on 13 October 2017. Based on the account written by Nando Parrado, it was presented in 2017 at Teatro la Candela in Montevideo, Uruguay and in 2018 at Teatro Regina in Buenos Aires, Argentina.^[62][63][64]

• Miracle Flight 571, composed and created by Lloyd Burritt, is a two-act chamber opera based on the book Miracle in the Andes by Nando Parrado. It received its musical premiere at the 2016 What Next Festival of Music.^[65][66]

Musicedit

• Thomas Dolby's debut LP, The Golden Age of Wireless, contained the instrumental "The Wreck of the Fairchild" (loosely based on the 1972 Uruguayan plane crash) in its first UK edition; this was excised from the first US release but restored on the 2009 remastered collector's edition CD.

• Miracle in the Andes, composed and created by musician Adam Young, is a musical score comprising 10 tracks that tell the story of the Andes flight disaster through song.^[67]

• Punk band GBH included a graphic experience of the passengers on the Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 in their song "Passenger on the Menu" (1982).^[68]

• "The Plot Sickens", by the American metalcore band Ice Nine Kills, appears on their 2015 album Every Trick in the Book.^[69]

• The song "Snowcapped Andes Crash" appears on Melody's Echo Chamber's self-titled 2012 album.

In other Mediaedit

• Sarah Marshall and Blair Braverman chronicled the story in the podcast, You're Wrong About, in October 2022 for its Halloween episode.

See alsoedit

• 1947 BSAA Avro Lancastrian Star Dust accident, crashed into Mount Tupungato on 2 August 1947.

• LAN-Chile Flight 621, crashed in the Andes on 3 April 1961.

• LANSA Flight 508

• 2023 Caquetá Cessna Stationair crash

• Emergency position-indicating radiobeacon station

• List of accidents involving sports teams

• List of incidents of cannibalism

• Donner Party

Referencesedit