The Andean saga, which was told quite well on the big screen via the 1993 film ALIVE (based on the 1974 book of the same name by English writer Piers Paul Read, who is one of those interviews here), is given further resonance by showing the viewer the stark bareness of the mountain landscape, and the immense dangers they faced, including the avalanche that hit the fuselage seventeen days into the ordeal and snuffed out the lives of eight who survived the initial crash. And when the survivors ran out of normal food in or near the tenth day of the ordeal, they had to make that terrible decision that defined this tragic saga: to eat the remains of their dead friends in order not only to survive, but to allow Parrado and Canessa the strength to surmount the Andes and get help. They were given up for dead after the seventh day. Because the roof of the Fairchild was white, even the planes that spent seven days flying right over where the fuselage lay could never have seen it, buried as it was in tens of feet of snow. But in truth, the fuselage that they had to spend two months surviving in lay on a glacier just within the Argentinean side of the range, between the Tinguiririca Volcano in Chile (fifteen miles to the southwest) and Cerro Sosneado (20 miles due east), at an elevation of 11,700 feet. The survivors themselves had believed, from the dying words of the pilot, that they had passed the town of Curico in Chile, which meant that the Andes had been breached. For another, the pilots misjudged their position in flying over the Andes, making a right turn northward toward Santiago well before they would have actually totally crossed the range. For one, the aircraft that was being used to charter the rugby team, the Fairchild, had a very poor safety record at the time.
#SHINEDOWN I AM ALIVE PLUS#
Combining a staged recreation of the events along with interviews from the two men, Fernando Parrado and Roberto Canessa, who made the long trek from the crash site into Chile, plus several other survivors, I AM ALIVE also reveals, though interviews with aeronautical and mountain climbing veterans, aspects of the crash and the subsequent ordeal that were not necessarily known by the public at large, or even the survivors, at the time. This is the story told by the History Channel's 2010 documentary film I AM ALIVE: SURVIVING THE ANDES PLANE CRASH. And in those 72 days, those involved had to make arguably the most horrifying decision imaginable in order to survive. Out of the forty passengers, many of whom were members of a Uruguayan rugby crew traveling to Chile to play a match, only sixteen people made it out alive. It came to an end on December 22, 1972, when two of the survivors of the crash hiked thirty-seven miles out of the Andes and west into Chile. It began on October 13, 1972, when a Uruguayan Air Force plane carrying forty passengers and a crew of five went off course and crashed in the Andes. There's probably no greater a 20th century survival story than what became known as the Miracle Of The Andes. Parrado, who lost his mother, sister, and scores of friends among the 29 victims of Uruguayan Flight 571, shares a complete, candid and unflinching account of the 72 days of suffering that followed the crash, including factors that led to his courageous decision to climb out of the mountains and-together with fellow survivor Roberto Canessa-save 15 others. For the first time ever, the hero of Uruguayan Flight 571, Nando Parrado, tells his story in its entirety.
Against all odds one man led an expedition into the mountains in a desperate attempt to reach civilization.
Fighting just to stay alive, hope was a cruel mirage in a landscape that offered nothing but despair and death. Trapped in the sub-zero degree temperatures for over 72 days, the survivors faced circumstances that no human should ever have to endure. But for 16 survivors, including 20 year-old Nando Parrado, what they experienced was worse than death. For 72 days, the world thought they were dead. On Friday, the 13th of October, 1972, a charter plane carrying 45 passengers, including a college rugby team, vanished over the desolate, snow-covered Andes Mountains.