Helicopter crash
Chile’s former president Piñera died
Sebastián Piñera pilots a helicopter through the rainy south of Chile. But he loses control. Now the former Chilean president is dead.
According to the Interior Ministry, in addition to Piñera, there were three other people on board who were able to reach the shore under their own power after the crash and survived. Emergency services recovered the ex-president’s body from the water.
The conservative Piñera was president of the South American country from 2010 to 2014 and from 2018 to 2022. He was followed in March 2022 by the left-wing politician and current President Gabriel Boric.
Numerous past and present presidents from Latin America expressed their condolences. Argentina’s President Javier Milei expressed his condolences through the presidential office to the family, friends and the Chilean people on behalf of the Argentine state. Uruguay’s President Luis Lacalle Pou and Colombia’s former President Juan Manuel Santos also mourned. “Sebastián Piñera was a good personal friend and a great ally of Colombia,” Santos wrote on the platform X, formerly Twitter. Former Mexican President Felipe Calderón said: “Chile has lost one of its best presidents.”