Miracle in The Andes

by Nando Parrado

Carefully I reached up to touch the crown of my head. Clots of dried blood were matted in my hair, and three bloody wounds formed a jagged triangle about four inches above my right ear. I felt rough ridges of broken bone beneath the congealed blood, and when I pressed down lightly I felt a spongy sense of give. My stomach heaved as I realised what this meant - I was pressing shattered pieces of my skull against the surface of my brain. My heart knocked against my chest. My breath came in shallow gasps.

The Fairchild finally departed from Mendoza Airport at 2.18 p.m., local time. As we climbed, the plane banked steeply into a left turn and soon we were flying south, with the Argentine Andes rising to our right on the western horizon. Through the windows on the right side of the fuselage, I gazed at the mountains, which thundered up from the dry plateau below us like a black mirage, so bleak and majestic, so astonishingly vast and huge, that the simple sight of them made my heart race. Rooted in massive swells of bedrock with colossal bases that spread for miles, their black ridges soared up from the flatlands, one peak crowding the next, so that they seemed to form a colossal fortress wall. I was not a poetically inclined young man, but there seemed to be a warning in the great authority with which these mountains held their ground, and it was impossible not to think of them as living things, with minds and hearts and an old brooding awareness. No wonder the ancients thought of these mountains as holy places, as the doorstep to heaven, and as the dwelling place of the gods.

When I look back on this moment, I cannot say why this news did not destroy me. Never had I needed my mother’s touch so badly, and now I was being told I would never feel that touch again. For a brief moment, grief and panic exploded in my heart so violently that I feared I would go mad, but then a thought formed in my head, in a voice so lucid and so detached from everything that I was feeling that it could have been someone whispering in my ear. The voice said, Do not cry. Tears waste salt. You will need salt to survive.

‘There is more,’ Gustavo told me. ‘Panchito is dead. Guido, too. And many others.’ I shook my head feebly in disbelief. How could this be happening? Sobs gathered in my throat, but before I could surrender to my grief and shock, the voice spoke again, and louder. They are all gone. They are all a part of your past. Don’t waste energy on things you can’t control. Look forward. Think clearly. You will survive.

I knew him well, I knew his deep practicality, and I knew he would not allow himself the luxury of false hope. To survive a plane crash in the Andes? At this time of year? Impossible. Now I saw him clearly, my strong, loving father tossing in his bed, staggered by his unimaginable loss. After all his concern for us, all his work and planning, all his trust in the orderliness of the world and the certainty of our happiness, how could he bear the brutal truth? He could not protect us. He could not protect us. My heart broke for him, and this heartbreak was more painful than the thirst, the cold, the grinding fear and the shattering pain in my head. I imagined him grieving for me. Grieving for me! I could not stand the idea that he thought I was dead.

Soon the darkness in the plane was absolute, and the cold closed on us like the jaws of a vice. The ferocity of the cold stole my breath away. It seemed to have a malice in it, a predatory will, but there was no way to fight off its attack except to huddle closer to my sister. Time itself seemed to have frozen solid.

Each day he would change the bloody bandages and bathe the wounds in some eau de cologne he had found, hoping that the alcohol content would keep the wounds from going septic. But Rafael’s wounds were constantly oozing pus, and the skin of his leg was already turning black. Gustavo and Roberto suspected gangrene, but Rafael never allowed himself to sink into self-pity. Instead he kept his courage and humour, even as the poison flowed through his system and the flesh of his leg rotted before his eyes. ‘I am Rafael Echavarren!’ he would shout every morning, ‘and I will not die here!’ There was no surrender in Rafael, no matter how he suffered, and I felt stronger every time I heard him say those words.

We became obsessed by the search for food, but what drove us was nothing like ordinary appetite. When the brain senses the onset of starvation - that is, when it realises that the body has begun to break down its own flesh and tissue to use as fuel - it sets off an adrenaline surge of alarm just as jarring and powerful as the impulse that compels a hunted animal to flee from an attacking predator. Primal instincts had asserted themselves, and it was really fear more than hunger that compelled us to search so frantically for food. Again and again we scoured the fuselage in search of crumbs and morsels.

The centre of the wound was moist and raw, and there was a crust of dried blood at the edges. I could not stop looking at that crust, and as I smelled the faint blood-scent in the air, I felt my appetite rising. Then I looked up and met the gaze of other boys who had also been staring at the wound. In shame, we read each other’s thoughts and quickly glanced away, but for me, something had happened that I couldn’t deny: I had looked at human flesh and instinctively recognised it as food. Once that door had been opened, it couldn’t be closed, and from that moment on my mind was never far from the frozen bodies under the snow.

He simply refused to be told what to do. For example, Roberto had a horse that he would ride to school each morning, even though the Christian Brothers repeatedly forbade him to bring the animal onto school grounds. Roberto simply ignored them. He would tie the horse to the bicycle rack, it would work its tether free, and an hour or so later the Brothers would find it wandering in the garden, munching their prized shrubs and flowers. He also spurred the big animal through the crowded streets of Carrasco, galloping along sidewalks and through busy intersections so fast that the horse’s shoes struck sparks on the pavement. Drivers swerved and pedestrians lurched out of his way. Our neighbours constantly complained, and once or twice the police spoke to Roberto’s father, but Roberto continued to ride.

There was a moment of complete silence, then I heard a slow, wet creak as the loose snow settled under its own weight and packed around me like rock. I tried to move, but it felt as if my body were encased in concrete, and I couldn’t even wiggle a finger. I managed a few shallow breaths, but soon snow packed into my mouth and nostrils and I began to suffocate. At first, the pressure in my chest was unbearable, but as my awareness dimmed, I stopped noticing the discomfort. My thoughts grew calm and lucid. This is my death, I told myself. Now I will see what lies on the other side. I felt no strong emotion. I didn’t try to shout or struggle. I simply waited, and as I accepted my helplessness, a sense of peace overtook me. I waited patiently for my life to end. There were no angels, no revelations, there was no long tunnel leading to a golden loving light. Instead, I sensed only the same black silence I had fallen into when the Fairchild hit the mountain. I drifted back into that silence. I let my resistance fade. It was over. No more fear. No more struggle. Just bottomless silence, and rest.

Arturo smiled at the lie. ‘I am ready, Nando,’ he continued. ‘I made my confession to God. My soul is clean. I will die with no sins.’ ‘What’s this?’ I laughed. ‘I thought you didn’t believe in the kind of God who forgives your sins.’ Arturo looked at me and managed a thin, self-deprecating grin. ‘At a time like this,’ he said, ‘it seems wise to cover all the angles.’

Of course, there was no time for such introspective thought on that storm-swept mountain. I was acting on instinct alone, and as I pictured Roy sobbing in the snow, all the scorn and derision I had felt towards him in the last few weeks exploded into a murderous fury. Impulsively, I swore like a madman into the gusting winds. ‘Mierda! Carajo! La reconcha de la reputisima madre! La reputa madre que lo recontra mil y una parió!’ I was out of my mind with anger, and before I knew it, I was crashing down the slope to where Roy had fallen. When I reached him, I kicked him savagely in the ribcage. I fell on him, slamming my knees into his side. Kneeling on him, I balled my fist and battered him with hard punches. As he rolled and screamed in the snow, I abused him verbally just as viciously as I attacked him with my fists.

‘Think of your mother, Roy,’ I told him, with my lips pressed to his ear so he could hear me in the storm. ‘If you want to see her again, you must suffer for her now.’ His jaw was slack, and his eyes were rolling up under their eyelids. He was on the verge of passing out, but still he managed a feeble nod: he would fight. For me, this moment of bravery was as remarkable as any of the other acts of courage and strength that we saw in the mountains, and now, when I think of Roy, I always think of him in this moment, as a hero.

ON 10 DECEMBER, GUSTAVO AND I spoke with concern about Numa. ‘He asked me to check a sore on his backside,’ Gustavo said, ‘and I got a look under his clothes. There is no flesh at all on his bones. He can’t last more than a couple of days.’ I left Gustavo and knelt at Numa’s side. ‘How are you feeling, Numa?’ Numa smiled weakly. ‘I don’t think it will be much longer for me.’ I saw a look of acceptance in his eyes. He was facing his death with courage, and I did not want to dishonour this by telling him lies. ‘Try to hold on,’ I said. ‘We’ll be climbing soon. We are going west, at last.’

Everything I did that morning had the feel of ceremony, of consequence. My thoughts were razor sharp, but reality seemed muffled and dreamlike, and I had the feeling I was watching myself from a distance. The others stood by quietly, not sure what to say. I had left them before, when we’d set off on the eastern trek, but I’d known from the start that that trip was merely an exercise. This morning I felt a heavy sense of finality about my departure, and the others felt it, too. After so many weeks of intense camaraderie and common struggle, there was suddenly a distance between us. I had already begun to leave them.

I was the one who had insisted most forcefully that it was possible to reach Chile on foot. I know the others saw my behaviour as confident and optimistic, and perhaps it gave them hope. But what looked to them like optimism was really nothing of the sort. It was panic. It was terror. The urge that drove me to trek west was the same urge that drives a man to jump from the top of a burning building. I had always wondered how a person thinks in such a moment, perched on the ledge, cringing from the flames, waiting for the split second when one death makes more sense than another. How does the mind make such a choice? What is the logic that tells you the time has come to step into thin air? This morning I had my answer.

Put the left foot there. Yes, that edge will hold. Now, with the left hand, reach up for the crack in that boulder. Is it sturdy? Good. Lift yourself. Now, put the right foot on that ledge. Is it safe? Trust your balance. Watch the ice! I forgot myself in the intensity of my concentration, forgot my fears and fatigue, and for a while I felt as if everything I had ever been had disappeared, and that I was now nothing more than the pure will to climb. It was a moment of pure animal exhilaration. I had never felt so focused, so driven, so fiercely alive. For those astonishing moments, my suffering was over, my life had become pure flow.

In that moment all my dreams, assumptions and expectations of life evaporated into the thin Andean air. I had always thought that life was the actual thing, the natural thing, and that death was simply the end of living. Now, in this lifeless place, I saw with a terrible clarity that death was the constant, death was the base, and life was only a short, fragile dream. I was dead already. I had been born dead, and what I thought was my life was just a game death let me play as it waited to take me.

‘Roberto,’ I said, ‘can you imagine how beautiful this would be if we were not dead men?’ I felt his hand wrap around mine. He was the only person who understood the magnitude of what we had done and of what we still had to do. I knew he was as frightened as I was, but I drew strength from our closeness. We were bonded now like brothers. We made each other better men.

‘How did you survive, Nando?’ he asked, ‘So many weeks without food . . .’ I told him that we had eaten the flesh of those who didn’t survive. The expression on his face didn’t change. ‘You did what you had to do,’ he said, his voice cracking with emotion. ‘I am happy to have you home.’

‘Papa,’ I said to him one day in Viña del Mar, ‘I am sorry I could not save Mami and Susy.’ He smiled sadly and took my arm. ‘When I was certain all of you were dead,’ he said, ‘I knew I would never recover from the loss. It was as if my house had burned to the ground, and I had lost everything I owned, forever. And now, to have you back, it’s as if I have stumbled on something precious in the ashes. I feel I am reborn. My life can begin again. From now on, I will try not to feel sorry for what was taken from me, but to be happy for what was given back.’ He advised me to do the same. ‘The sun will come up tomorrow,’ he told me, ‘and the day after that, and the day after that. Don’t let this be the most important thing that ever happens to you. Look forward,’ he said. ‘You will have a future. You will live a life.’