cannibalism
After a plane crash, the survivors ate human flesh – and even 50 years later they have no regrets
Shot of survivors of the 1972 Andes plane crash photographed by the rescue crew
©UPI/Picture Alliance
It was the “Miracle of the Andes”: After a plane crash 50 years ago, 16 people survived for more than two months in hostile conditions – also because they ate human flesh.
Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 (“Fuerza Aérea Uruguaya”) crashed in the Andes on October 13, 1972. In addition to five crew members, there were 40 players and supervisors from a Uruguayan rugby team and their families on board. They were on their way from Montevideo to Santiago de Chile when a terrible accident happened due to a navigation error: the pilots dived too early, the plane grazed the mountains several times, was badly damaged and crashed.
Twelve people died directly, 33 survived the crash. They found themselves in snow and freezing cold at an altitude of 3800 meters. Five others died on the first night in temperatures of 30 to 40 degrees below freezing. The rest fought desperately for survival – and resorted to all means in an emergency.
Survivors of the plane crash were presumed dead
At first, the survivors were able to feed themselves from the meager supplies that were on the plane. They hoped to be rescued, but on the eighth day they were told by a radio that was still working that the search for them had been called off.
Officially, they were now considered dead – and were completely on their own in the hostile environment. The only food left was a few bars of chocolate, a few biscuits and several bottles of wine. Despite strict rationing, these were quickly used up.
So the medical student Roberto Canessa brought up an outrageous suggestion: cannibalism. The survivors should eat their dead fellow passengers to avoid suffering the same fate. A decision that was anything but easy: “My only problem was that these were the bodies of my friends. I had to go to their families later to explain it to them,” Canessa recalled in the “Daily Mail” in 2016.
Cannibalism as a last resort for survival
However, in the end most of them had no other choice. While some didn’t have the heart to eat the corpses, most did. And even after 50 years, the survivors do not regret their decision. “In a way, our friends were some of the first organ donors in the world – they helped feed us and keep us alive,” Ramon Sabella, now 70, told the Sunday Times on the 50th anniversary of the tragedy.
Pieces were cut out of the meat with glass. According to Sabella, this type of diet was not pleasant: “Of course, the idea of eating human flesh was horrible, repulsive. It was difficult to put it in your mouth, but we got used to it.”
The survivors would have given each other permission for the others to eat them if they died. They wanted to ease their conscience. Six bodies were initially left untouched out of consideration for their surviving relatives. But some of them were eventually eaten, leaving only two corpses in the end.
Rescue after more than two months
The survivors of the crash spent more than two months in the mountains. An avalanche killed ten more people. Again and again, survivors set out to look for help. On one of these expeditions, Canessa and another man were finally found by a local shepherd.
Finally, helicopters from the Chilean Air Force found the scene of the accident. 16 survivors could be rescued. Even today one speaks of the “miracle of the Andes”.
Source: “Sunday Times” / “Daily Mail”