Miracle in the Andes: Chapter Five - Abandoned PDF

''An astonishing account of an unimagi -JON KRAKAUER '~ _,.... __ • ~: :~;;:~;:~:..... - ~i" ;;\ff • -~(",'.lrl,.,;r•' - ; .' . Chapter Five Abandoned -- 72. Days on the Mountain and My Long Trek Home PARRADO w ~ ... our eleventh day on the mountain, I stood outside the fuselage, lea...

''An astonishing account of an unimagi -JON KRAKAUER '~ _,.... __ • ~: :~;;:~;:~:..... - ~i" ;;\ff • -~(",'.lrl,.,;r•' - ; .' . Chapter Five Abandoned -- 72. Days on the Mountain and My Long Trek Home PARRADO w ~ ... our eleventh day on the mountain, I stood outside the fuselage, leaning against the Fairchild's aluminum hull. It was a clear morning, about half past seven, and I was warming myself in the first rays of the sun, which had just risen above the mountains to the east. Marcelo and Coco Nicholich were with me, and so was Roy Harley, a tall, swift wing-forward for the Old Christians. At eighteen, Roy was one of the youngest passengers on the plane. He was alsothe closest thing we had to an electronics expert, having once helped a cousin install a complicated stereo system in his house. Just after the crash, Roy had found a battered transistor radio in the litter of the wreckage, and with a lit• tle t i n k e ~ ~ d it back to life. In the rocky cordillera, reception was very poor, but Roy fashioned an antenna from electrical wires he had stripped from the plane, and with a little effort Vfe were able to tune in stations from Chile. Early each morning, Marcelo would wake Roy and lead him out onto the glacier, where he would manipuJ.ate the antenna while Roy worked the dial, Their hope was to hear news about the progress of rescue efforts, but so far they had managed only to pick up soccer scores, weather reports, and political propaganda from stations controlled by the Chilean government. This morning, like all the others, the signal faded in and out, and even when reception was at its best, the radio's small speaker crackled with static. Roy did not want to waste the batteries, so, after fiddling with the dial for several minutes, he was about to turn the radio off when we heard, throi1gh all the buzzing and popping, EARLY THE NEXT MORNING, 104 I Nando Parrado the voice of an announcer reading the news. I don't recall the exact wotds he used, but I will never forget the tinny sound of his voice and the dispassionate tones with which he spoke: After ten days of fruitless searching, he said, Chilean authorities have called off all efforts to find the lost Uruguayan charter flight that disappeared over the Andes on October 13. Search efforts in the Andes are sirnply too dangerous, he said, and after so much time in the frigid mountains, there is no chance that anyone still survives. After a moment of stunned silence, Roy cried out in disbelief, and then began to sob. "What?" cried Marcelo. "What did he say?" "Suspendieron la busqueda!» Roy shouted. "They have canceled the search! They are abandoning us!" For a few seconds Marcelo stared at Roy with a look of irritation on his face, as if Roy had spoken gibberish, but when Roy's words sank in, Marcelo dropped to his knees and let out an anguished howl that echoed through the cordillera. Reeling from shock, I watched my friends' reactions with a silence and sense of detachment that an observer might have mistaken for composure, but in fact I was falling to pieces, as all the claustrophobic fears I'd been struggling to contain were now bursting free, like floodwaters over a crumbling dam, and I felt myself being swept toward the brink of hysteria. I pleaded with God. I cried out to my father. Driven more powerfully than ever bytlie animal urge to sprint off blindly into the cordillera, I manically scanned the horizon as if, after ten days on the mountain, I might suddenly spot an escape route I hadn't seen before. Then, slowly, I turned west and faced the tall ridges that blocked me from my home. With new clarity, I saw the terrible power of the mountains. What foolishness it had been to have thought that an untested boy like me could conquer such merciless slopes! Reality bared its teeth for me now, I saw that all my dreams of climbing were nothing more than a fantasy to keep my hopes alive. Out of terror and defiance, I knew what I had to do: I would run to a crevasse and leap MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 105 into the green depths. I'd let the rocks smash all the life and fear and suffering from my body. But even as I pictured myself falling into silence and peace, my eye was on the western ridges, guessing at distances and trying to imagine the steepness of the slopes, and • the cool voice of reason was whispering in my ear: That gray line of rock might give some good footing. . , . There might be some shelter under that outcrop just below that ridge. ... It was a kind of madness, really, clinging to hopes of escape even though I knew escape was impossible, but that inner voice gave me no other choice. Challenging the mountains was the only future this place would allow me, and so, with a sense of grim resolve that was now more ferociously entrenched than ever before, I accepted in my heart the simple truth that I would never stop fighting to leave this place, certain the effort would kill me, but frantic to start the climb. Now, a frightened voice drew my attention. It was Coco Nicholich, standing at my side. "Nando, please, tell me this is not true!" he starnm~red, 1 'It is true," I hissed. "Carajo. We are dead." "They are killing us!" cried Nicholich. "They are leaving us here to die!" "I have to leave this place, Coco," I cried softly. "I can't stay here another niinute!" Nicholich noddfd toward the fuselage. "The others have heard us;' he said. I turned and saw several of our friends emerging from the plane. "What's the news?" someone called out. "Hav~ they spotted us?" "We have to tell them:' whispered Nicholich. We both glanced at Marcelo, who sat slumped in the snow. "I can't tell them:' he mumbled. "I can't bear it." The others were closer now. "What's going on?" someone asked. "What did you hear?'' I tried to speak, but my words caught in my throat. Then 106 / Nando Parrado Nicholich stepped forward and spoke firmly, despite his own fear. "Let's go inside," he said, "and I'll explain." We all followed Coco back into the fuselage and gathered around him. "Listen, guys;• he said, "we have heard some news. They have stopped looking for us:• The others were stunned by Coco's words. Some of them cursed, and some began weeping, but most simply stared at him in dis belief. "But don't worry;• he continued, "this is good news:• '½.re you crazy!" someone shouted. "This means we are stuck • here forever!" I felt panic gathering in the group, but Coco kept his head and continued. "We have to stay calm:' he said. "Now we know what we have to do. We have to rely on ourselves. There's no reason to wait any longer. We can start making plans to get out on our own!' "I have made my plans;• I snapped. "I.am leaving this place now! I will not die here!" "Cairn down, Nando;' said Gustavo. "Fuck no, I will not calm down! Give me some meat to <;arry. Someone lend me another jacket, Who will come with mel I will go by myself if I have to. I will not stay here another second!" Gustavo took my arm. "You're talking nonsense;' he said. "No, no, I can do itl" l pleaded. "l know I can. I will climb out of here, find help ... but I have to go now/" "If you go now, you will die:' Gustavo replied. "I am dead if I stay here!" I said. "This place is our graveyard! Death touches everything here. Can't you see it? I can feel its hands on me! I can smell its fucking breath!" . "Nando, shut up and listen!" shouted Gustavo. "You have J:O winter gear, you have no experience at climbing, you are weak, we don't even know where we are. It would be suicide to leave now. These mountains would kill you in a day." "Gustavo is right:' said Numll. "You are not strong enough yet. Your head is still cracked like an egg. You would be throwing your life away:' MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 107 ''We have to go!" I shouted. "They have given us a death sentence! Are you just going to wait here to die?" I was rummaging through the fuselage blindly, searching for anything-gloves, blankets, socks-that I thought would help me on the trek, when Marcelo spoke to me softly. "Whatever you do, Nando;' he said, "you must think of the good of the others. Be smart. Don't waste yourself. We are still a team, and we need you:• Marcelo's voice was steady, but there was a sadness in it now, a sense of wounded resignation. Something inside him had shattered when he heard that the search had been canceled, and it seemed that in ~oments he had lost the strength and confidence that had mad~ him such a trusted leader. Leaning against the wall of the passenger cabin now, he seemed smaller, grayer, and I knew he was slipping rapidly into despair. But my respect for him was still very deep, and I could not deny ~e wisdom·of his words, so, reluctantly, I nodded in agreement and found a place to sit beside the others on the fuselage floor, "We all need to stay calm;' said Gustavo, "but Nando is right. We will die if we stay ljere, and sooner or later we will have to climb. But we must do it iµ the smartest way, We must know what we're up against. I say two or three of us climb today. Maybe we can get a look at what lies beyond these mountains." "It's a good idea;• said Fito, "On the way, we can look for the tail section. T!iere might be food and warm clothing inside. And if Roque is right, the batteries for the radio are there, too:' "Good:' said Gustavo. "I will go. If we leave soon, we can be back before the sun goes down. Who is coming with mel" "I am;' said Numa, who had already survived the first attempt to climb the western slopes. "Me too," said Daniel Maspons, one of the brave ones who helped cut the flesh. Gustavo nodded. "Let's find the warmest clothes we can, and get started," he said. "Now that we know the score, there is no time to Jose:' 108 / Nando Parrado It took Gustavo less than an hour to organize the climb. Each of the climbers would carry a pair of the seat-cushion snowshoes that Fito had invented, and a pair of the sunglasses Fito's cousin Eduardo had made by cutting lenses from tinted plastic sun visors in the cockpit and stringing them together with copper wire. The snowshoes would keep the climbers from sinking into the soft snow, and the sunglasses would shield their eyes from the fierce glare of the sun on the snow-covered slopes. Otherwise they were poorly protected. They wore only sweaters pulled over light cotton shirts and thin summer trousers. They all wore lightweight moccasins on their feet. The others would be climbing in canvas sneakers. None of them wore gloves, and they had no blankets with them, but it was a clear day, winds were light, and the bright sun warmed us enough to make the mountain air bearable. If the climbers stuck to their plan and returned to t11e Fairchild before sundown, the cold should not be a danger. "Pray for us," Gustavo said, as the climbers set off. Then we watched the three of them stride across the glacier toward the high • summits in the distance, following the path the Fairchild had plowed through the snow. As they made their way slowly up the slope and into the distance, their bodies grew smaller and smaller until they were just three tiny specks inching their way up the white face of the mountain. They seemed as smal+ and fragile as a trio of gnats as they climbed, and my respect for their courage had no end. All morning we watched them climb, until they disappeared from view, then we kept vigil until late afternoon, scouri;'g the slopes for any signs of movement. As the light faded there was still no sign of them. Then darkness fell and the bitter cold forced us back into the shelter of the fuselage. That night, stiff winds battered the Fairchild's hull and forced jets of snow in through every chink and crevice. As we huddled an1:l shivered in our cramped quarters, our thoughts were with our friends on the open slopes. We prayed earnestly for their safe return, but it was hard to be hopeful. I tried MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 109 to imagine their suffering, trapped in the open in their flimsy clothes, with nothing to shield them from the killing wind. All of us knew very well what death looked like now, and it was easy for me to imagine my friends lying stiff in the snow. I pictured them like the bodies I'd seen at the burial site outside the fuselage-the same waxy; blue-tinged pallor on the skin, the senseless, rigid faces, the crust of frost clinging to the eyebrows and the lips, thickening the jaw, whitening the hair, I saw them that way, lying motionless in the dark, three more friends who were now mere frozen things. But where, exactly; had they fallen? This question began to fascinate me. Each had found the exact moment and place of his death. When was my moment? Where was my place? Was there a spot in these mountains where I would finally fall and lie like the rest, frozen forever? Was there a place like this for each of usl Was this our fate, to lie scattered in this nameless placel My mother and sister here at the crash site; Zerbino and the others on the slopes; the rest of us wherever we lay when death decided to take us? What if we learned that escape was impossible? Would we simply sit here and wait to diel And if we did, what would life be like for the last few survivors, or, worse, for the very last one? What if that last one was mel How long could I stay sane, sitting alone in the fuselage at night, with only ghosts for company, and the only sound the constant growl of the windl I tried to silence these thoughts by joining the others in another prayer for ~he climbers, but in my heart I wasn't sure whether I was praying for their safe retmn or simply for the grace of their souls, for the grace of all our souls, because I knew that even as we lay in the relative safety of the fuselage, death was closing in. It is only a matter of time, I told myself, and perhaps the ones on the mouniain tonight are the lucky ones, because for them the wait is over. "Maybe they have found some shelter;' someone said. "There is no shelter on that mountain;' Roberto replied. "But you climbed, and you survived;' someone pointed out. 110 / Nando Parrado "We climbed in daylight and still we suffered;" Roberto answered, "It must be forty degrees colder up there at night:' "They are strong:• someone offered. Others nodded and, out of respect, held their tongues. Then Mar~elo, who had not spoken for hours, broke the silence. "It's my fault;' he said softly, "I have killed you all." We all understood his despondency and had seen this coming. "Don't think that way, Marcelo," said Fito. "We all share the same fate here. No one blames you.'' "I chartered the plane!" Marcelo snapped. "I hired the pilots! I scheduled the matches and persuaded you all to come.'' "You did not persuade my mother and my sister:' I said. "I did that, and now they're dead. But I cannot take the blame for this. It's not our fault that a plane falls from the sky." "Each of us made his own choice," someone said. "You are a good captain, Marcelo, don't lose heart." But Marcelo was losing heart, very rapidly, and it troubled me to see him in such misery, He had always been a hero to me. When I was in grade school, he was already a rugby standout for Stella Maris, and I loved watching him play, He had a commanding, enthusiastic presence on the field and I always admired the joy and confidence with which he played the game. Years later, when I found myself playhig beside him for the Old Christians, my respect for his athletic gifts only deepened. But it was rp.ore than his rugby prowess that won my respect. Like Arturo, Marcelo was different from the rest of us, more principled, more mature. He W£\S a devout Catholic who followed all the teachings of the Church and tried his best to live a virtuous life. He was not a self-righteous person; in fact, he was one of the humblest guys on the team. But he knew what he believed, and often, using ·the same authority and quiet charisma with which he pushed us to be better teammates, he would coax us to be better men. He was constantly chiding Panchito and me, for example, about our restless obsession with the MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 111 opposite sex. "There is more to life than chasing girls:' he would tell us with a wry smile, "You two need to grow up a little, and get serious about your lives.'' Marcelo himself had vowed to be a virgin until he married, and a lot of the guys teased him about this, Panchito especially thought it was laughable-no women until you are married? For Panchito, this was like asking a fish not to swim. But Marcelo took the jokes in stride, and I was always impressed by the seriousness and self• respect with which he carried himself. In many ways, he was very different from Arturo, the ardent socialista with the heretical notions of God, but like Arturo, he seemed to know his own mind well. He had thought carefully about all the important issues of his life, and he knew with clarity where he stood. For Marcelo, the world was an orderly place, watched over by a wise and loving God who had promised to protect us. It was our job to follow His commandments, to take the sacraments, to love God and to love others as Jesus had taught us. This was the wisdom that formed the foundation of his life and shaped his character. It was also the source of his great confidence on the field, his sure-footedness as our captain, and the charisma that made him such a strong leader, It is easy to follow a man who has no doubts. We had alwayii trusted in Marcelo completely. How could he allow himself to falter now, when we needed him the most? Perhaps, I thought, he was never as strong as he seemed. But ihen I understood: Marcelo had been broken not because ~ mind was weak, but because it was too strong, His faith in the rescue was absolute and unyielding: God would not abandon us. The authorities would never leave us here to die. When we heard the news that the search had been canceled, (t must have felt to Marcelo like the earth beneath his feet had begun to crumble. God had turned His back, the world had been turned upside down, and all the things that had made Marcelo such a great leader-his confidence, his decisiveness, his UI!shakable faith in his • 112 / Nanda Parrado MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 113 own beliefs and decisions-now prevented him from adjusting to the blow and finding a new balance. His certainty, which had served him so well in the ordinary world, now robbed him of the balance and flexibility he needed to adjust tp the strange new rules by which we were battling for our lives. When the ground rules changed, Marcelo shattered like glass. Watching as he quietly sobbed in the shadows, I suddenly understood that in this awful . place, too much certainty could kill us; ordinary civilized thinking could cost us our lives. 1 vowed to myself that I would never pretend to understand these mountains. I would never get trapped by my own expectations. 1 would never pretend to know what might happen next. The rules here were too savage and strange, and I knew I could never imagine the hardships, setbacks, and horrors that might lie ahead. So I would teach myself to live in constant uncertainty; moment by moment, step by step. I would live as if I were dead already. With nothing to lose, nothing could surprise me, nothing could stop me from fighting; my fears would not block me from following my instincts, and no risk would be too great. "Those are rocks," someone muttered. "They weren't there before." "Your mind is playing tricks;' sighed someone else. "Just watch. They are moving:' A little lower on the slope was a dark outcrop of rock. Using this rock as a reference point, I kept my gaze on the dots. At first I was sure they were stationary, but after a minute or two it was clear that the dots had moved closer to the outcrop. It was true! "It's them! They're moving!" "Puta carajo! They are alive!" Our spirits soared and we slapped and shoved each other in our happiness. ''Vamos, Gustavo!" ((Com~ on, Numal Come on, Daniel! 11 "Come on, you bastards! You can make it!" It took the three of them two hours to work their way down the slope and across the glacier, and all that time we shouted encouragement to them and celebrated as if our friends had returned from the dead. But the celebration ended abruptly when they got close enough for us to see their condition. They were stooped and battered, too weak to lift their feet from the snow as they shuffled toward us, leaning on each other for support. Gustavo was squinting and groping as if he'd gone blind, and all three seemed so weary and unstable that I thought the lightest breeze might blow them down. But the worst thing was the look on their faces. They seemed to have aged twenty years overnight, as if the mountain had blasted the youth and vigor from their bodies, and in their eyes I saw something that had not been there before-the unsettling combination of dread and resignation you sometimes see on the faces of very old men. We rushed to meet them, then helped them into the fuselage and gave them cushions to lie on. Roberto examined them immediately. He saw that their feet were nearly froien. Then he noticed the tears streaming from Gustavo's bleary eyes. THE WINDS BLEW all that night, and few of us slept, but at last morning came. One by one we brushed the frost from our faces, slipped our feet into our frozen shoes, and forced ourselves to our feet. Then we gathered outside the plane and began to scan the mountains for signs of our lost friends. The skies were clear, the sun had already warmed the air, and the winds had weakened. into a light breeze. Visibility was quite good, but after hours of watching we had spotted no movement on the slopes. Then, in late morning, someone shouted. "Something is moving!" he said. "There, above that ridge!" ''I see it, toot" said someone e'lse. I stared at the mountain and finally saw what the others were seeing: three black dots on the snow. 114 / Nanda Parrado MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 115 "It was the glare on the snow;' said Gustavo, "The sun was so strong .. :• "Didn't you use your sunglasses?" Roberto asked. "They broke;' said Gustavo, "It feels like sand in my eyes. I think I am blind." Roberto put some drops in Gustavo's eyes-something he'd found in a suitcase that he thought might soothe the irritationand wrapped a T-shirt around Gustavo's head to shade his damaged eyes from the light. Then he told the rest of us to take turns rubbing the climbers' frozen feet. Someone brought them large portions of meat, and the climbers ~te ravenously. After they had rested, they began to talk about the climb. "The mountain is so steep," said Gustavo. "In places it is like climbing a wall. You have to clutch the snow in front of you to pull yourself up:' ''And the air is thin;' said Maspons. "You gasp, your heart pounds. You take five steps and it feels like you have run a mile." "Why didn't you come back before nightl" I asked them. "We climbed all day and were only halfway up the slope;' said Gustavo. "We didn't want to come back and tell you we had failed. We wanted to see beyond the mountains, we wanted to come back with good news. So we decided to find shelter for the night, then climb again in the morning:' The climbers told us how they had found a level place near a rocky outcrop. They made a short wall out of large stones they found lying about, and huddled behind this wall, hopin& it would shield them from the wind at night. After so many nights freezing in the fuselage, the climbers didn't think it was possible to suffer much more from the cold. They quickly discovered they were wrong, "The cold up on those slopes is indescribable;' said Gustavo. "It rips the life from you. It's as painful as fire. I never thought we would live until morning." They told us how they had suffered horribly in their light clothing, punching each other in the arms and legs to keep the blood moving in their veins, and lying close together to share the warmth of their bodies. AB the hours crawled by, they were certain their decision to stay on the mountain had cost them their lives, but somehow they lasted until dawn, and finally they felt the first rays of sun warming the slopes. Amazed to be alive, they let the sunshine thaw their frozen bodies, then they turned to the slope and resumed the climb. • "Did you find the tail?" Fite asked, . "We only found pieces of wreckage and some luggage;' Gustavo. answered, ''And some bodies:' Then he explained how they had found the remaihs of people who had fallen from the plane, many of them still strapped to their seats, "We took these things from the bodies:' he said, pulling out some watches, wallets, religious medallions, and other personal effects he had taken from the corpses. "The bodies were very high up the slope," said Gustavo, "but we were still far from the summit. We didn't have the strength to keep climbing, and we didn't want to get trapped for another night," Later that night, when things were quiet in the fuselage, I went to Gustavo. "What did yoU; see up there?" I asked. "Did you see beyond the peaks? Did you see any green?" He shook his head wearily. "The peaks are too high. You can't see far,,, "But you must have seen something." He shrugged. "I saw between two peaks, into the distance , ..". "What did you seel" "I don't know, Nando, something yellowish, brownish, I couldn't really tell, it was a very narrow angle. But one thing you should 116 / Nando Parrado MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 117 know: When we were high on the mountain I looked down at the crash site. The Fairchild is a tiny speck in the snow. You can't tell it from a rock or a shadow, There is no hope that a pilot could see it from a plane. There was never any chance we would be rescued." good thing for all of us. "The cousins;' as we called them, gave us a strong, stable center that prevented the group from disintegrating into factions, and saved us from all the conflict and confusion that might have caused. They also were able to convince most of the survivors that our Jives were in our own hands now, and that each of us had to do everything he could to survive. Yielding to that advice, and to Javier's pleading, Liliana finally began to eat. One by one, the rest of the holdouts-Numa, Cache, and the others-did the same, telling themselves that drawing life from the bodies of their dead friends was like drawing spiritual strength from the body of Christ when they took Communion, Relieved that they were nourishing themselves, I didn't dispute their rationale, but for me, eating the flesh of the dead was nothing more than a hard, pragmatic choice I had made to survive. I was moved by the knowledge that even in death, my friends were giving me what I needed to live, but I felt no uplifting sense of spiritual connection with the dead. My friends were gone. These bodies were objects now. We would be fools if we didn't use them. As the days pass~d, we became more efficient at processing the meat. Fito and the cousins took responsibility for cutting the flesh and rationing it to us, and soon they had devised an efficient system. After cutting the meat into small pieces, they would arrange it on pieces of aluminum and let it dry in the sun, which made it much easier to stomach. On the rare occasion when we had a fire they even cooked it, which improved its taste dramatically. For me, eating the meat became easier over time. Some could not overcome their revulsion, but all of us were eating enough now to hold starvation at bay. Out of respect for me, the others had promised not to touch the bodies of my mother and sister, but even so, there were enough bodies to last us for weeks ifwe rationed the meat carefully. To make the food last even longer, we eventually began to eat the kidneys, the livers, and even the hearts. The~e internal organs were THE NEWS THAT the search had been canceled convinced even the most hopeful among us that we were on our own, and that our only chance of survival now was to save ourselves. But the failure of Gustavo's mission disheartened us, and as days passed, our spirits were battered further by the realization that Marcelo, in his selfdoubt and despair, had quietly abdicated his role as our leader. There seemed to be no one to take his place. Gustavo, who had led by his courage and resourcefulness from the very first moments of our ordeal, had been devastated by the mountain, and could not re· gain his strength. Roberto was still a strong presence, and we had come to rely on his cleverness and keen imagination, but he was an extremely headstrong young man, far too irritable and belligerent to inspire the kind of trust we'd had in Marcelo. Rapidly, in the absence of a single strong leader, a looser, less formal style of leadership emerged. Alliances formed, based on previous friendships, similar temperaments, and common interests. The strongest of these alliances was the one made up of Fito and his cousins Eduardo Strauch and Daniel Fernandez. Of the three, Fito was the youngest and the most prominent. He was a quiet boy, and at first I thought he was almost painfully shy, but he soon proved himself to be bright and level-headed, and while he had an unilinclring grasp of how steeply the odds were stacked against us, I knew he intended to fight with all his strength to help us all survive. The three cousins were extremely close, and with Daniel and Eduardo consistently following Fito's lead, they presented a unifying force that gave them a great deal of influence over all the decisions we made. This was a 118 / Nando Parrado MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 119 highly nutritious, and as grisly as it may sound, by this point in the ordeal, most of us had grown numb to the horror of friends being butchered like cattle. Still, eating human flesh never satisfied my hunger, and it never gave me back my strength. I was still wasting away, like the others, and the small amo\lht of food we allowed ourselves each day only slowed the process of starvation. Time was running out, and I knew that soon I would be too weak to climb. This became my greatest fear, that we would grow so weak that escape woµld become impossible, that we would use up all the bodies, and tl;ien we'd have no choice but to languish at the crash site as we wasted, staring into each other's eyes, waiting to see which of our friends would become our food. That horrible scenario preoccupied me, anq. sometimes it took all my discipline to keep myself from ignoring the wishes of the others and setting off on my own. But the near disaster of Gustavo's expedition had given me a new understanding of how difficult the climb would be. Like all the others, I was stunned by what the mountains had done to Gustavo, who was fainous for his toughness and stamina on the field. Why should I believe I could conquer the mountain when he could not? In moments of weakness I would surrender to despair. Look at these mountains, i would tell myself. It's impossible, we are trapped here. We are finished. All of our suffering has been in vain. But each time I gave in like this to defeat and self-pity, the face of my father would drift up from memory, reminding me of his suffering, and of the promise I had made to return to him. At times, when I thought I couldn't stand the cold or the thirst or the gnawing terror for one more second, I'd feel a powerful urge to surrender. "You can end this whenever you want," I would tell myself. "Lie down in the snow. Let the cold take you. Just rest. Be still. Stop fighting." These were comforting, seductive thoughts, but if I savored them too long the voice in my mind would interrupt me. When you climb, make sure every fingerhold is a good one. Don't trust a rock to hold you, test every step, Probe the snow for hidden crevasses, Find good shelter for the nights . , , I would think about climbing, and that would remind me of my promise to my father. I would think of him and let my heart fill with love for him, and this love would be stronger than my suffering, or my fear. After two weeks on the mountain, my love for my father had taken on the irresistible power of a biological drive, I knew that someday I would have to climb, even though I'd be climbing to my doom. llut what did it matter? I was a dead man already. Why not die in the mountains, fighting for each step, so that when I died, I would die one step closer to homel I was ready to face such a death, but as inevitable as that death seemed, I still felt a flicker of hope that I might somehow stumble through the wilderness and make it home. The thought of leaving the fuselage terrified me, even though I couldn't wait to leave. I knew that somehow I would find the courage to face the mountains; I also knew I would never be brave enough to face them alone. I needed a companion for the journey, someone who would make me stronger and better, and so I began to study the others, weighing their strengths, their temperaments, their performanc;e under pressure, trying to imagin~ which of these ragged, starving, frightened boys I would most want by my side. 'Iwenty-four hou,s earlier the question would have had a simple answer: I would want Marcelo, our captain, and Gustavo, whose strength of character I had always admired, But now Marcelo was in despair, and Gustavo had been battered and blinded by the mountain, and I feared that neither one of them would recover in time to go with me. So I turned my eye to the other healthy survivors, and as I watched them, a few quickly caught my attention. Fito Strauch had proven his bravery in the first attempt to climb the mountain, and had earned all our respect for his calmness and clear thinking throughout the ordeal. Fito's cousins, Eduardo and 0 120 / Nando Parrado MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 121 Daniel Fernandez, were a great source of strength for him, and I wondered at times how he would perform on his own in the mountains, but Fito was definitely high on my list, So was Numa Turcatti. Numa had impressed me from the start, and as the days passed my respect for him had deepened, Although he had been a stranger to most of us before the crash, he had quickly won the friendship and admiration of all the survivors, Numa made his presence felt through quiet heroics: no one fought harder for our survival, no one inspired more hope, and no one showed more compassion for the ones who suffered most. Even though he was a n_ew friend for most of us, I believe Numa was the best loved man on the mountain. Daniel Maspons, who had climbed bravely with Gustavo, was another candidate. So was Coco Nicholich, whose selflessness and composure had impressed me. Antonio Vizintin, Roy Harley, and Carlitos Paez were all healthy and strong. And then there was Roberto, the brightest, most difficult, most complicated character on the mountain. Roberto had always been hard to handle. The son of a renowned cardiologist in Montevideo, he was brilliant, self-confident, egotistical, and interested in following no one's rules but his own. Because of his contrary nature, he was constantly in trouble at school, and it seemed his mother was always being called into the headmaster's office to endure another conference about Roberto's transgressions. 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, munchlng 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 neighbors cqnst~tly complained, and once or twice the police spoke t~ Roberto's father, but Roberto continued to ride. Hoping to find a constructive outlet for Roberto's unruliness, the Christian Brothers encouraged him to play rugby, where his forceful nature made him a formidable presence on the field. He played left wing, the same position as Panchito played on the right, but where Panchito would gracefully dodge and weave his way past tacklers toward the try-line, Roberto preferred to batter a more direct path through the opposition, one head-on collision after another, He was not one of our bigger players, but his thick legs were so impressively developed that, along with his famous muscleheadedness, they earned him the nickname Musculo- "Muscles;' Powered by such sturdy limbs and such natural belligerence, Roberto was more than a match for much larger opponents, and he loved nothing more than to lower his shoulder and send some oversized, would-be tackler flying. Roberto loved rugby, but it didn't cure his stubbornness as the Christian Brothers had hoped. Roberto was Roberto, on the field or off, and even in the middle of a hard-fought match, he refused to be told what to do. Our coaches prepared us well for each match, with scripted plays and strategies, and the rest of us tried as hard as we could to follow the game plan. But Roberto always reserved the right to improvise at will. Usually this meant he would keep the ball when he should have passed it, or would hhrl himself headlong into an opponent when the coaches wanted him to dance into the open. AB he grudgingly endured the coaches' reprimands, the dark glare in his piercing eyes showed defiance and impatience. He chafed at being told what to do. He simply felt his own way was better. And he lived this way in every facet of his life, Roberto's strongmindedness made him a challenging friend, and even in the comfortable circumstances of our lives in Carasco, he could be 122 / Nando Parrado arrogant and overbearing. In the pressure-packed atmosphere of the fuselage, his conduct was often insufferable. He routinely ignored decisions made by the group and turned on anyone whq challenged him, raining down rants and insults in the belligerent falsetto he used when his blood was hot. He could be brutally inconsiderate: Ifhe had to leave the plane at night to urinate, for example, he simply stepped on the arms and legs of whoever happened to be sleeping in his path, He slept where he wanted, even if it meant shoving others aside from the places they had chosen. Dealing with Roberto's quick temper and confrontational manner created stress we did not need and cost us energy we could not afford to squander, and more than once his hardheaded abrasiveness almost led to fights. But, despite his difficult nature, I respected Roberto. He was the most intelligent and ingenious of us all. Without his quick-witted medical care in the wake of the crash, many of the boys who were now recovering from their injuries might well be dead, and his creative thinking had solved many problems in ways that made us safer or more comfortable on the mountain. It was Roberto who realized that the Fairchild's seat covers could be removed and used as blankets, an innovation that may have saved us all from freezing. Most of the simple tools we used, and our crude selection of medical supplies, had been improvised by him from articles he'd scavenged from the wreckage. And for all his egotistical bluster, I knew he felt a strong sense of responsibility toward the rest of us. After seeing how Arturo and Rafael suffered at night as they lay. on the floor of the plane (and bellowing at them fiercely to stop their pathetic moaning), Roberto spent hours the next morning fashioning the swinging· hammocks that gave those two injured boys some relief from their pain. It was not compassion, exactly, that spurred him to do these things, it was more a sense of duty. He knew his gifts and abilities, and it simply made sense to him to do what he knew no one else could do. MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ 123 I knew Roberto's resourcefulness would be a great advantage in any attempt to escape. I also trusted his realistic view of our situation-he understood how desperate things were, and that our only hope was to save ourselves. But more than anything I wanted him with me simply because he was Roberto, the most determined and strong-willed person I had ever known. If there was anyone in our group who could stand up to the Andes through sheer stubbornness alone, Roberto was the one. He would not be the easiest traveling companion, and I worried that his difficult nature might plunge us into conflict on our way, sabotaging whatever slim chance we had to reach civilization. But, intuitively, I understood that Roberto's willfulness and strong sense of self would be the perfect complement to the wild impulses that drove me to flee blindly into the wild. With my manic urge to escape, I would be the engine that pulled us through the mountains; Roberto's cantankerous spirit would be the clutch that prevented me from revving out of control. I had no way of knowing what kind of hardships lay ahead in the wilderness, but I knew Roberto would make me stronger and better on the journey. He was the one I needed by my side, and when the time seemed right and we were alone together, I asked him to come with me on the trek. "We must do it;Roberto, you and I," I said. "We have the best chance of anyone here:' "You're crazy, Nanda," he snapped, his voice rising in pitch. "Look at these fucking mountains. Do you have any idea how high they arel" I gazed at the highest peak. "It seems maybe two or three times the Pan de Azucar," I said, referring to the tallest "mountain'' in Pruguay. Roberto snorted, "Don't be an idiot!" he screeched. "There's no snow on the Pan de Azucarl It is only fifteen hundred feet high! This mountain is ten times higher, at least!" • ''What choice do we have?" I answered. "We h~ve to try. For me, 124 / Nando Parrado MIRACLE IN THE ANDES \ lZS the decision is made. I am going to climb, Roberto, but I am afraid. I cannot do it alone. I need you to come with me:' Roberto shook his head ruefully. "You saw what happened to Gustavo;' he said. ''And they only made it halfway up the slope." "We can't stay here,'' I said. "You know that as well as I do. We need to leave as soon as possible:' "No way!" shouted Roberto. "It would have to be planned. We must do it the smartest way. We need to think through every detall. How would we climb? Which slope? Which direction?" "I think of these things constantly;' I said. "We will need food, water, warm clothing .. :• "How would we keep ourselves from freezing at night?" he asked. "We will find shelter beneath rocks;' I said, "or maybe dig caves knew I would certainly be one of the ones who tried, many of the survivors began to see me as a leader. Never in my life had I assumed such a role-I was the one who always drifted along, riding the current, letting others show the way. I certainly didn't feel like a leader now. Couldn't they see how confused and frightened I was? Did they really want a leader who felt in his heart that all of us were alreadl'i doomed? For my part, I had no desire to lead anyone; I needed all my strength just to keep.myself froru falling apart. I wor• ried I was giving them false hope, but in the end I decided that false hope was better than no hope at all, So I kept my thoughts to my• self. They were dark thoughts, mostly, but one night something remarkable happened. It was after midnight, the fuselage was dark and cold as always, and I was lying restlessly in the shallow, groggy stupor that was as close as I ever got to genuine sleep, when, out of nowhere, 1 was jolted by a surge of joy so deep and sublime that it nearly lifted me bodily from the floor. For a moment the cold van• ished, as if I'd been bathed in a warm, golden light, and for the first time since the plane had crashed, I was certain I would survive. In ~citement, I woke the others. «Guys, listen!" I cried. "We will be okay. I will have you home by Christmas!" My outburst seemed to puzzle the others, who only muttered softly and went back to sleep. In moments my euphoria passed. I tried all night to recapture the feeling, but it had slipped away. By morning my heart was filled once more with nothing but doubts and dread. in the snow:' "Timing is very important;' he said. "We would have to wait for the weather to improve:' "But we can't wait so long that we are too weak to make the climb;' I told him. Roberto was silent for a moment. "It will kill us, you know,'' he said. "It probably will;' I replied, "but if we stay here we are dead already. I cannot do this alone, Roberto. Please, come with me." For a moment Roberto seemed to study me with'his penetrating gaze, as if he'd never seen me before. Then he nodded toward the fuselage. "Let's go inside,'' he said. "The wind is picking up and I am fucking cold:' IN THE DAYS that followed, we were all preoccupied with discussions of our plan to climb out of the cordillera, and I soon realized that the others were beginning ·to trust in this plan as desperately as they had once trusted in the certainty of rescue. Because I'd been the first to speak openly about our need to escape, and because they