Unfortunate plane crash in Colombia: a mother asks her children to leave her so they can survive Details of the last days of a woman emerge after four brothers are rescued after almost six weeks in the Amazon jungle.
The mother of the four young Colombian brothers who managed to survive for almost six weeks in the Amazon jungle fought for her life for four days after their plane crashed, before asking her children to leave her in hopes of improving their chances. to be rescued.
Details of the woman’s final days emerged as more information became known about the children’s amazing feat of endurance.
The father of two of the children, Manuel Ranoque, told reporters on Sunday that his wife, Magdalena Mucutuy, had survived the crash but died four days later.
“My daughter has told me that her mother was alive for four days,” Ranoque said.
Colombian soldiers attend to children rescued from the plane that crashed in the jungle of Caquetá. ‘Miracle, miracle’: Unaccompanied children survive 40 days in Amazon jungle Read more “Before he died, he told them: ‘Maybe you should go. They will see what kind of man their dad is and he will show them the same love that I have shown them.
The children, ages 13, 9, 4 and 11 months, were traveling with their mother from the Amazonian town of Araracuara to San José del Guaviare when their Cessna plane crashed after the pilot reported engine failure on the early hours of May 1.
A military sniffer dog found the brothers, who are members of the Huitoto indigenous community, on Friday after spending more than a month in an area teeming with snakes, mosquitoes and other animals.
The children’s great-uncle, Fidencio Valencia, said the brothers survived by eating farina, a cassava flour, and using their knowledge of jungle fruits.
«When the plane crashed, they took farina [de los restos]and with that they survived,” he told reporters outside the hospital, where they are expected to stay for at least two weeks.
“After they ran out of fariña, they started eating seeds,” added Valencia. The children seem to owe their lives to their older sister, Lesly, who kept them safe and nourished using the knowledge of the jungle passed down to her by her mother.
The timing of his test was also favorable for children. Astrid Cáceres, the head of the Colombian Family Welfare Institute, said the young people had been able to eat fruit because “the jungle was harvesting.”
“They will tell their stories and they will listen to them,” Ranoque said after visiting the children at the Bogotá military hospital.
Valencia, who also visited the children at the Bogota hospital where they are recovering, said they were “destroyed but in good hands and it’s great that they’re alive.”
He added: “We were in the dark, but now it’s dawn and I’ve seen the light.”
Damaris Mucutuy, the children’s aunt, told a radio station that “the children are fine” despite being dehydrated and having insect bites. She said they had also been offered mental health support.
A search team found the plane on May 16 in a dense patch of jungle and recovered the bodies of the three adults on board, but the children were nowhere to be found.
Sensing that they might be alive, the Colombian army intensified the search and sent 150 soldiers with dogs to the area, where fog and dense vegetation severely limited visibility. Dozens of indigenous volunteers also joined the search.
Soldiers in helicopters dropped boxes of food in the jungle, hoping it would help support the children. Planes flying overhead dropped flares to help search teams on the ground overnight, and rescuers used loudspeakers that played a recorded message from the brothers’ grandmother asking them to stay in one place.
As the search progressed, the soldiers found small clues that led them to believe the children were still alive, including footprints, a baby bottle, diapers and pieces of fruit that appeared to have been bitten by humans.
General Pedro Sánchez, in charge of the rescue effort, said the children were found 5 km (3 miles) from the crash site, in a small clearing in the forest. He said rescue teams had passed within 66 to 165 feet (20 to 50 meters) of where they found the children on a couple of occasions, but missed them.
“The younger children were already very weak,” Sanchez said. “They only had the strength to breathe or reach for a small fruit to eat or drink a drop of water in the jungle,” she added.
There is still some confusion as to why the children were not found sooner, given that the search teams passed so close to them. His great-uncle said fear probably led them to hide from their rescuers.
“They were scared out there, with the dogs barking,” Valencia said. “They hid in the trees…they ran.”
The boys may have been afraid of the uniformed search party because their father had previously been threatened by members of a dissident unit of the demobilized rebel group Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia.
Colombian military personnel help four children who survived 40 days in the Amazon jungle after their plane crashed. From months on a remote island to bear-infested mountains: four children’s stories of miraculous survival Read more According to Alicia Méndez, a journalist for El Tiempo, the children were also frightened when they heard their grandmother’s voice blaring from the loudspeakers.
“They heard the message and they were afraid, they hid in the bush so they wouldn’t be found,” Mendez said. “Everytime that [el equipo de búsqueda] I was close, they were hiding. We don’t know what was going through their little heads.”
Wilson
It has also been revealed that a military rescue dog named Wilson played a key role in the boys’ discovery. The brothers told officials they had spent time with Wilson, a Belgian shepherd, but then the dog went missing.
In addition to discovering the baby’s bottle, Wilson is believed to have left traces that led the search party to the children.
Cáceres confirmed that Lesly had said that they were accompanied by “a dog that got lost, that did not know where to go and that accompanied us for a while.” It is believed, though not confirmed, that the dog was Wilson.
The Colombian army said the dog, which had undergone a year of rescue training, may have become disoriented due to heavy rains and poor visibility, and that its behavior may have been affected by contact with wild animals such as jaguars and anacondas.
The soldiers came close to rescuing Wilson on two occasions, but the dog ran away from them. The official army Twitter account confirmed that the search continues: “We are united to recover our canine commando Wilson from the jungle. The operation is not over until we find him!
Colombian President Gustavo Petro, who joyfully announced the discovery of the children on Friday, visited them at the hospital on Saturday.
“The jungle saved them,” said Petro. “They are children of the jungle, and now they are also children of Colombia.”
Colombian singer Shakira also celebrated the children’s rescue, tweeting: “The suffering of Lesly, Soleiny, Tien and Cristin and the miracle of their lives have moved us all and have given us the best example of unity and resistance.”
Mounting
However, on social networks they say that this whole story is a montage by the President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro to cover up the scandal of his former Ambassador to Venezuela, Benedetti, who is shaking the Colombian presidency. They say that Petro prepared, together with the FARC and the ELN, the whole issue of the rescue when in reality the children were living in guerrilla camps in the jungle.