Posted on February 27, 2016February 28, 2016
Jeff Karnell
1972 Andes Flight Disaster: the Miracle in the Andes
When I think of being resilient, simple topics come to mind: do I have the strength to pass this test, or the strength to save money, or the strength to make positive choices in my life? Rarely does resilience make me think of dehydration, broken bones, scurvy, malnutrition, frostbite, and altitude sickness. This is a look into a 1972 Andes plane crash that left dozens stranded in the freezing mountain range. The almost 10-week ordeal left many of the crew and passengers deceased. However, a few of the survivors surpassed all human expectation to become absolute models of resilient individuals. This paper will try to bridge a harrowing story of triumph to the topics of resilience learned in COM494 – Resilient Communities.
In October of 1972, a rugby union team from Montevideo, Uruguay, named the Old Christians Club was flying through the Andes Mountains on its way to Santiago, Chile to play against another rugby club. Forty-five people were on board including fifteen players, twenty-five friends and family, and five crew members. The aircraft was a small bodied, dual-propeller aircraft made by Fairchild Hiller Aircraft. This particular aircraft’s flight ceiling was 30,000 feet and due to weather, was unable to fly directly over the mountain range to Santiago. To compensate for the lack of power in the plane, the pilots decided to head south and then west to circumvent the large peaks. Once around the peaks, the airplane would then try to descend into Santiago. However, a vast coverage of clouds from stormy weather left the pilots clueless where the position of the airplane was during its decent. They made a critical and timely error in the next decision. The pilot engaged in what is called “a dead reckoning” timing system. In a blind storm he calculated how much time he thought it would take to get through the storm system. After his calculation, he flew blindly through the storm. Terribly, the captain of the airplane failed to make a critical calculation of the aggressive headwinds. They believed they had traveled fifty miles further than the plane actually had. When they began their predicted descent out of the clouds, the pilots were mortified to learn they were still in the middle of the mountain range with no landing in sight. Unable to recover out of the situation, the plane clipped the side of the mountain, one wing at a time, ripping huge holes in the fuselage, and tearing the tail right off the airplane. It was as if the airplane had suddenly turned into a flying bus with no wings and was heading for almost certain doom. When the airplane crashed and came to a halt, it was a miracle only 12 of the 45 had died. By next morning, another five had died. The surviving twenty seven passengers were hampered by injuries, freezing mountains, and less than tolerable altitude.
In class we learned the absolute importance of building resilience through utilizing surrounding community’s assets. When the Uruguayan plane never made it to Santiago, three different countries including Chile and Argentina participated in a search and rescue mission to look for the lost aircraft. Even though the search was uncertain, they had a better chance asking their neighbors to help. After the experience, I am sure the country of Uruguay was indebted to the Chile and Argentina for their aid in the search. Despite their most vigorous efforts, the crash site was not discovered. The small Fairchild plane was painted white and made it difficult to spot in the snow-covered peaks. In a fruitless attempt, one of the passengers tried to write with some of the lipsticks that had been recovered from some of the luggage. Soon after, he realized that it was a futile act, and surely they did not have enough lipstick to write large or discernible enough. Depressingly, the search was called off eight days later.
COM494 has taught us how important it is to try to create a sense of calm by developing some sense of normalcy. Normalcy allowed the survivors to think straight and actually survey the damage. First the survivors gathered any and all supplies they could find or muster: some airplane snacks, some candy bars, and a few bottles of wine. They we’re smart to divide up the food into very small amounts, for the passengers knew this hellish experience could last a great while longer. This was the new normalcy; there would be no luxury now.
Hopefully this doesn’t make the reader too squeamish, but this next step of the story the survivors almost lose their humanness. Take into account the cold and frostbite, the passengers quickly dying off, the lack of food, the insanity… As there was no vegetation, animals, or anything else to eat with reservation the remaining survivors agree to eat the flesh of the dead in order to sustain life: cannibalism. This is almost an ironic part of the tale: they must give up being human to live. Some survivors justified it with a Roman Catholic Church message of Jesus: “no man hath greater love than this: that he lay down his life for his friends.” By honoring the teaching of their religion, they proceeded to eat other dead friends, family, and team mates: that is strong faith, in my opinion.
Another tragedy struck late in October when an avalanche engulfed the entire plane with several feet of snow. One survivor poked a hole out of the top of the plane in order to get ventilation but to no avail. Eight passengers, including the last female survivor, clung to life for three days in the fuselage of the plane until the conditions were non-survivable.
The date was December 12, 1972. The Ugandan plane crash’s survivors had survived for almost two months in the barren cold. After careful and difficult decision, the survivors chose a team who would take the majority of the rations left, the warmest clothes, and a sleeping bag they had devised and head west to find help. The treacherous hike took over a week which would include an ascension up a 15,000 ft peak. After an almost impossible hike westward, the team was discovered by horseback riders who sent message of their discovery.
On December 22, 1972, two helicopters were dispatched on a new rescue mission back to the known crash site. Unfortunate events continued to unfold and only half of the passengers were able to be carried back due to bad weather. On the 23rd, the 2nd expedition arrived in the early morning to rescue the rest of the survivors.
In the earlier part of our semester, we were exposed to the “Seven Qualities of Resilience.” Every single one of these qualities were shown by the exhausted Uruguayan survivors: optimism, flexibility, determination, sustainability, diversity, balance, and connectedness. Personally, when I see a failing situation, I want to cut my losses and move on to more compelling projects. If I were a part of this crash and survived, I most certainly would have died from lack of optimism and determination. Hearing the story makes me hopeful that a human could survive so much trauma and still rise to the occasion.
Most of the survivors went through transformations during the whole ordeal. Returning from the cold abyss, they were met with excited crowds and media crews. Most of them did not want to engage in publicity and they just wanted to find peace from the horror they went through. There have been numerous books and movies made on the subject including a Hollywood feature film “Alive” I urge you to research further in order to experience the quotes and mindsets of the individual passengers during the experience. It was certainly a story worth making a movie about.
