The story broke in a Peruvian newspaper and was immediately picked up by the Argentinian, Chilean, and Brazilian papers. As soon as the journalists in Santiago sniffed the story, they fell once again upon the survivors and asked if it was true. Confused, the boys continued to deny it, but those who had betrayed their secret had furnished the proof, and on December 26 the Santiago newspaper El Mercurio published on its front page a photograph of a half-eaten human leg lying in the snow against the side of the Fairchild. The boys conferred as to what they should do and decided that, rather than talk about what had happened to any particular newspaper, they would hold a news conference when they returned to Montevideo. Since they had been in touch with the president of the Old Christians, Daniel Juan, they agreed that the conference should be held at their old school, the Stella Maris College.

These were frail defenses against the tornado that raged around them. The news—which had been given to the papers by the Andinists—merely whetted the appetites of the world's press, and the boys in the hotel were bombarded with questions which they would not answer. Indeed, they became increasingly disgusted with the journalists, who showed no reticence or tact in what they asked. There were even persistent suggestions by an Argentine journalist that the avalanche had not occurred but had been invented to

conceal the fact that the stronger boys had killed the weaker ones to provide themselves with food.

The survivors were still exceedingly vulnerable, and these assaults upset them. Moreover, they saw that a Chilean magazine which usually specialized in pornography had taken two pages to print photographs of limbs and bones which had lain around the Fairchild. Another Chilean newspaper printed the story under the headline: "May God Forgive Them." When some of the parents saw this, they wept.

The atmosphere in the Sheraton San Cristobal was poisoned by this clamor. The survivors were impatient to return to Montevideo and reluctantly agreed to fly rather than go by bus and train. Charlone (who had never been forgiven by some of the parents for what they considered to be poor treatment of Madelon Rodriguez and Estela Perez) arranged for a Boeing 727 of LAN Chile to take them on December 28. Before that, however, Algorta left with his parents to stay with friends outside Santiago. Parrado too left the Sheraton San Cristobal with Juan and Graciela and his father—first to the Sheraton Carrera in the center of Santiago, then to a house in Vina del Mar which had been lent to them by friends. He was tired of being photographed every moment of the day and disgusted at the journalists' callous questions. Even the incessant celebrations were somehow depressing, for though he was alive, the two women whom they had all loved most in the world remained as frozen corpses in the Andes.

Fifteen

i

The story of the survival of the young Uruguayans, after ten weeks in the Andes, had been sensational enough to interest the newspapers and radio and television stations of the whole world, but when the news broke that their survival had depended on eating the dead these same media went wild. The story was broadcast and printed in almost every nation in the world, with one notable exception-Uruguay itself.

There had been reports, of course, of the discovery and rescue of the survivors, but when rumors of cannibalism reached the news desks of the papers in Montevideo they were treated first with skepticism and then with reticence. There was at that time no censorship of the press (beyond a ban on any mention of the Tupamaros); the decision by the Uruguayan journalists to wait until their fellow countrymen had returned to Montevideo and given

their account of what had happened can only be explained as the product of a spontaneous patriotic reserve.

This is not to say that there were not journalists eager to discover whether the rumors were true, but since most of the survivors were still in Santiago it was not an easy thing to do. Daniel Fernandez, however, was already in Montevideo. He had been met at the airport by his parents, who had driven him to their flat and refused to allow any visitors. By the next day, however, the whole block was besieged by friends and journalists eager to see him. It was Christmas Day and the Fernandezes could not keep their door closed forever, so they opened it to admit one friend-but once open it could not be shut again. A horde of journalists and acquaintances poured into the apartment, and Daniel agreed to be interviewed.

He sat facing the group of journalists, and one of them suddenly handed him a piece of paper and asked him to read it. Daniel unfolded it and saw a Telex message with the news that he and the other fifteen survivors had eaten human flesh.

"I have nothing to say about that," he said.

"Can you confirm or deny it?" asked the journalist.

"I have nothing to say until my friends are back in Uruguay," said Daniel.

While this exchange was taking place, Juan Manuel Fernandez read the Telex. "The man who wrote this is a son of a bitch and the man who brought it here is even more of a son of a bitch," he said, most forcefully. He was about to show the journalist unceremoniously to the door, but a friend of Daniel's restrained him and the journalist departed of his own accord.

After he had left, Fernandez took his son aside and said, "Look, now, you must say that this isn't true."

"It is true," said Daniel.

The father looked abruptly at the son with an expres-

sion of mild distaste on his face; but later, when he realized that it was something his son had done from necessity, he got used to the idea and was surprised that it had not occurred to him before.

The Boeing 727 of LAN Chile which had been chartered by Charlone to fly the survivors and their families back to Montevideo was given the elite crew used when President Allende himself went abroad. It stood ready on the tarmac of Pudahuel airport on the afternoon of December 28 while its sixty-eight passengers were given an emotional and ceremonious farewell by the Chileans, who had on the whole treated them so well.

They boarded the plane at four o'clock but were forced to wait an hour before takeoff. The first reason for delay was Vizintin, who had been kept in Santiago by an interview; then there were the weather reports from the cordillera. These were still unfavorable, but rather than alarm the survivors the crew told them that they had run out of fruit juice and had to replenish their supplies.

Vizintin arrived, but still the plane stayed on the tarmac. The survivors were nervous and tense as they strapped themselves into their seats. Most of them had wanted to return overland and had only consented to go by plane because the journey through the Andes and across Argentina by train was considered dangerous in their present state of health.

At last the weather reports were favorable and the plane took off. A short time later the pilot, Commander Larson, announced that they were over Curico, but no one accepted his invitation to come to his cabin and look down on the town whose name had meant so much to them. As a group

they were nervous not just because they were up in an airplane again but because they were uncertain of what lay ahead in Uruguay. They talked compulsively among themselves and to the two Chilean journalists who were traveling with them.

One of these—Pablo Honorato from El Mercurio— sat next to Pancho Delgado, who, when the plane began to land at Carrasco airport, became even more nervous than he had been and grabbed Honorato. But then there arose shouts of "/Viva Uruguay/" and then "/Viva Chile/" to keep up the courage of the survivors. As the plane circled over Montevideo, and they saw once again the muddy waters of the River Plate and the roofs and streets of their beloved city, they began to sing their national anthem:

Orientals, our country or the grave, Liberty, or death with glory. . . .

As the last word burst from their lips, the plane touched down on Uruguayan soil.

The plane taxied across the tarmac and came to a stop outside the same airport building that they had left so optimistically almost eleven weeks before. The differences between that departure and this return were many; while only one or two members of their families had come to see them off, the whole city of Montevideo seemed now to be there to greet them, including the wife of the President of Uruguay. The balconies on the airport building were lined with shouting, waving people, and there were lines of police to keep this crowd from surging onto the tarmac.

The survivors and their families were ushered into buses which drove up alongside the airplane. The boys wanted to be driven in front of the balconies so that they could salute their friends, but on the instructions of the Army the buses drove straight out of the airport toward the Stella Maris College.

Everything was ready for their arrival. The large brick assembly hall, designed by the father of Marcelo Perez, had been laid out as for a prize-giving, with a long table on a podium and a system of microphones and loudspeakers which would enable the many journalists who were already seated facing this stage to hear what was said. It was not only the Christian Brothers who had done this but also the officers of the Old Christians, who greeted the survivors as the coaches turned into the driveway of the school.

It was an emotional reunion and one in which the turmoil of the situation—with cameras whirling and clicking all around them—could not blunt the grievous truth that among those who now climbed off the bus and took their places on the podium there were only three members of the rugby team which had set out for Chile: Canessa, Zerbino, and Vizintin. Parrado and Harley were still in Chile. As Daniel Juan and Adolfo Gelsi looked at the thin, bearded faces, they searched for their champions—Perez, Platero, Nicolich, Hounie, Maspons, Abal, Magri, Costemalle, Martinez-Lamas, Nogueira, Shaw—but they were not there.

Nevertheless the whole group of survivors had entrusted the press conference to the care of the Old Christians, and with calm mastery of a potentially chaotic situation—a room packed with journalists from all over the world, parents, parents of the dead, friends, relations, and television cameras—Daniel Juan took his seat on the center of the podium and the conference began.

The survivors had decided that they would speak in turn, each of them taking a particular aspect of their experience, and when they had finished they would ask the Uruguayan press if they wished to question them further. The only dispute among them was as to how they should treat the question of cannibalism. Some of the boys and their parents thought that they should be quite frank about what had happened; others considered that it would be enough for some vague allusion to be made to it. A third

group—notably Canessa and his father—thought that no mention should be made of it at all.

A compromise was reached: Inciarte would speak about it. He offered to do so, and it was agreed that he was the most suitable person because of his high-minded attitude to what had happened, but on the day of the conference itself Coche began to have doubts about his own abilities. He stuttered, and he was afraid that in front of all the journalists and cameras he would break down. Pancho Delgado volunteered to take his place.

The conference began. The whole room listened in silence as, one after the other, the survivors told their heroic and tragic story, until it was Delgado's turn. Almost at once his eloquence—which had been of such little use on the mountain—came into its own.

"When one awakes in the morning amid the silence of the mountains and sees all around the snow-capped peaks-it is majestic, sensational, something frightening—one feels alone, alone, alone in the world but for the presence of God. For I can assure you that God is there. We all felt it, inside ourselves, and not because we were the kind of pious youths who are always praying all day long, even though we had a religious education. Not at all. But there one feels the presence of God. One feels, above all, what is called the hand of God, and allows oneself to be guided by it. . . . And when the moment came when we did not have any more food, or anything of that kind, we thought to ourselves that if Jesus at His last supper had shared His flesh and blood with His apostles, then it was a sign to us that we should do the same—take the flesh and blood as an intimate communion between us all. It was this that helped us to survive, and now we do not want this—which for us was something intimate, intimate—to be hackneyed or touched or anything like that. In a foreign country we tried to approach the subject in as elevated a spirit as possible, and now we tell it to you, our fellow countrymen, exactly as it was. . . ."

As Delgado finished, it was quite evident that the entire company was deeply moved by what he had said, and when Daniel Juan asked the assembled journalists if they had any questions to ask the survivors he was told that there were none. Whereupon the whole room burst into a spontaneous hurrah for the gentlemen of the Uruguayan and international press, followed by a final cheer for those who had not returned.

With the conclusion of the press conference, the public ordeal of the survivors, which had followed so closely on their private ordeal, came to an end, and they were able at last to return to the homes and families of which they had dreamed while imprisoned high up in the Andes.

It was not easy to adapt to the reality. Their experience had been long and terrible; its effect had gone deep into both their conscious and unconscious minds and their behavior reflected this shock. Many of the boys were brusque and irritable with their parents, novias, and brothers and sisters. They would flare up at the least frustration of their smallest whim. They were often moody and silent or would talk compulsively about the accident. Above all, they would eat. No sooner was a dish set on the table than they would attack it, and when a meal was over they would stuff themselves with sweets and chocolates so that Canessa, for example, became bloated in the space of only a few weeks.

Their parents felt helpless in the face of this behavior. Some had been warned by the psychiatrists in Santiago who had briefly examined some of their sons that they might face some difficulty in readapting to normal life and that there was little they could do to help. Their case, of course, was as baffling to psychiatrists as it was to the parents themselves, for there were few case histories relating to a breach of

this particular taboo. No one could know what the effect would be on their minds; they could only wait and see.

Some of the parents were also in a state of shock. It was as if they were paralyzed by surprise and gratitude at the sight of those sons whom they had given up for dead. Coche Inciarte's mother, for example, was unable to take her eyes off her son as he ate. At night she lay in the same room as he did but did not close her eyes; she simply watched her son as he slept.

The mothers who were best equipped to deal with the unique situation in which they found themselves were Ro-sina and Sarah Strauch and Madelon Rodriguez. Not only did these three women have strong personalities which nothing could intimidate; they also looked upon the whole saga as theirs as well as their sons'. They behaved, as it were, as if their faith and their prayers were as much responsible for the survival of the boys as the boys' own efforts. They were quite decided in their own minds on something which still confused the boys themselves—the meaning of what they had been through. To these three the boys had disappeared and then returned to prove to the world the miraculous powers of the Virgin Mary—in the case of the Strauch sisters, the Virgin of Garabandal.

The beneficiaries of this miracle were justifiably confused because other interpretations were put forward. On the one hand they were aware that many—especially among older people—were appalled by what they had done and considered that they should have chosen to die. Even Made-Ion's mother, who as much as anyone had believed in the return of her grandson, could not bring herself to contemplate this aspect of his survival.

The Catholic Church, however, was quick to dismiss this primitive reaction. "You cannot condemn what they did," said Monsignor Andres Rubio, Auxiliary Bishop of Montevideo, "when it was the only possibility of survival. . . . Eating someone who has died in order to survive is in-

corporating their substance, and it is quite possible to compare this with a graft. Flesh survives when assimilated by someone in extreme need, just as it does when an eye or heart of a dead man is grafted onto a living man. . . . What would we have done in a similar situation? . . . What would you say to someone if he revealed in confession a secret like that? Only one thing: not to be tormented by it . . . not to blame himself for something he would not blame in someone else and which no one blames in him."

Carlos Partelli, the Archbishop of Montevideo, con-fimed his opinion. "Morally I see no objection, since it was a question of survival. It is always necessary to eat whatever is at hand, in spite of the repugnance it may evoke."

And finally the theologian of VOsservatore Romano, Gino Concetti, wrote that he who has received from the community has also the duty to give to the community or its individual members when they are in extreme need of help to survive. Such an imperative extends especially to the body, which is otherwise consigned to dissolution, to use-lessness. "Considering these facts," Father Concetti went on, "we justify on an ethical basis the fact that the survivors of the crash of the Uruguayan airplane fed themselves with the only food available to avoid a sure death. It is legitimate to resort to lifeless human bodies in order to survive."

On the other hand, the church did not concur with the view that had been expressed by Delgado at the press conference that eating the flesh of their friends was equivalent to Holy Communion. When Monsignor Rubio was asked whether a refusal to eat the flesh of a dead human being could be interpreted as a form of suicide, and the opposite as an act of communion, he replied, "In no way can it be understood as suicide, but the use of the term communion is not correct either. At most it is possible to say that it is correct to use this term as a source of inspiration. But it is not communion."

It was clear, therefore, that the survivors were to be

regarded neither as saints nor as sinners, but a role was increasingly sought for them as national heroes. The newspapers and radio and television stations began to take an understandable pride in what these young fellow countrymen had achieved. Uruguay was a small nation in a large world, and never since their soccer victory in the World Cup in 1950 had the activities of any Uruguayans achieved such world renown. There were many articles describing their courage, endurance, and resourcefulness. The survivors, on the whole, rose to the occasion. Many of them kept their beards and long hair and were not ill pleased to be recognized wherever they went in Montevideo and Punta del Este.

Though every interview and article emphasized that their achievement had been the work of the whole group, it was inevitable that some of the survivors should fit the role of national hero more successfully than others. Some, for example, were not even on stage. Pedro Algorta had gone to join his parents in Argentina. Daniel Fernandez had retired to his parents' estancia in the country. His two cousins, Fito and Eduardo Strauch, were too taciturn to project for the public an image which corresponded to the part they had played on the mountain.

The ablest exponent of the whole experience was Pan-cho Delgado, and it was quite natural, because he was the one who had dealt with the question of cannibalism at the press conference, that the press should look to him for further information. Delgado rose to the occasion. He went by bus to Rio de Janeiro (with Ponce de Leon) to appear on television and gave extensive interviews to the Chilean magazine Chile Hoy and the Argentinian review Gente. It was not surprising either that Delgado, finding himself once again in a situation where his talents could be useful, should use them; nor that the press should take advantage of so eloquent a survivor. His prominence in the public eye, however, did not endear him to his former companions.

The other member of the group whose behavior some felt was unseemly was Parrado. His character had undergone a greater metamorphosis than that of the others. The timid, uncertain boy had emerged from the ordeal as a dominating, self-assured man who was everywhere recognized and acclaimed as the hero of the Andean odyssey, but the man still contained the tastes and enthusiasms of the boy and, being freed now from his close acquaintance with death, he was determined to indulge them.

Thinking him dead, his father had sold his Suzuki 500 motorcycle to a friend, but so pleased was he to see Nando return from the grave that he bought him an Alfa Romeo 1750. In it Parrado roared off along the coast to Punta del Este to lead the sweet life on the beaches and in the cafes and nightclubs of the glamorous resort. All the beautiful girls who had previously thought of him as the shy friend of Panchito Abal now flocked around him and vied with one another for his attention. Parrado did not hold back. The only thing he permitted to draw him away from Punta del Este was the Formula One races in Buenos Aires. There he met drivers Emerson Fittipaldi and Jackie Stewart, and they were photographed together, for everywhere Parrado went he was followed by a horde of journalists and photographers.

These pictures all appeared in the Uruguayan papers and dismayed his fifteen companions. When the paper showed him among a gaggle of bathing beauties in Punta del Este as a judge of a beauty competition, they voiced their objection and Parrado withdrew; to him, as to the others, the unity of the sixteen was still of the greatest importance.

While he recognized that it was their combined efforts which had saved their lives, however, Parrado felt that his own achievement was a triumph which he should be allowed to celebrate. Life had conquered over death and should be lived to the full in the same way as he had lived it before . . . but of course some things had changed forever.

One evening in the middle of January he went into a nightclub with a friend and two girls. It was a place he had frequented with Panchito Abal, and he had not been there since the crash. As he sat down at a table and ordered drinks, he was suddenly struck with the truth that Panchito was dead, and for the very first time in the three months of trial and suffering, he burst into tears. He fell forward onto the table and cried and cried and cried. He could not stem the flood of tears, so the four of them left the nightclub. Soon after that, Parrado started work again, selling nuts and bolts at La Casa del Tornillo.

The reason why the other fifteen survivors looked askance at Parrado's return to the kind of life he had led before was that they themselves had a more elevated—almost a mystical—concept of their experience. Inciarte, Mangino, and Methol felt certain that they were the beneficiaries of a miracle. Delgado considered that to have lived through the accident, the avalanche, and the weeks which followed could be ascribed to the hand of God, but that the expedition was more a manifestation of human courage. Canessa, Zerbino, Paez, Sabella, and Harley all felt that God had played a fundamental role in their survival; that He had been there, present, on the mountain. On the other hand, Fernandez, Fito and Eduardo Strauch, and Vizintin were more inclined to believe in all modesty that their survival and escape could be ascribed to their own efforts. Certainly, prayer had assisted them—it had been a bond which held them together and a safeguard against despair—but if they had relied on prayer alone they would still be up on the mountain. Perhaps the greatest value of the grace of God had been to preserve their sanity.

The two most skeptical about the role God had played in their rescue were Parrado himself and Pedro Algorta. Parrado had good reason, for like many of them he could see

no human logic in the selection of the living from the dead. If God had helped them to live, then He had allowed the others to die; and if God was good, how could He possibly have permitted his mother to die, and Panchito and Susana to suffer so terribly before their death? Perhaps God had wanted them in heaven, but how could his mother and sister be happy there while he and his father continued to suffer on earth?

Algorta's case was more complex, for his Jesuit education in Santiago and Buenos Aires had left him better equipped to deal with the mysteries of the Catholic faith than had the simpler theological education of the Christian Brothers. Moreover he had been, before he left, among the more earnestly religious of the passengers on the plane. He had not had the easy though somewhat unorthodox familiarity with God of Carlitos Paez, but the orientation of his life— especially his political convictions—was centered around the precept that God is love. After seventy days in the wilderness of the Andes he did not believe any the less that God was love, but it had taught him that the love of God was not something to count on for survival. No angels had come down from heaven to help them. It was their own qualities of courage and endurance which had seen them through. If anything, the experience had made him less religious; he now had a stronger belief in man.

They all agreed, however, that their ordeal on the mountain had changed their attitude toward life. Suffering and privation had taught them how frivolous their lives had been. Money had become meaningless. No one up there would have sold one cigarette for the five thousand dollars which they had amassed in the suitcase. Each day that passed had peeled off layer upon layer of superficiality until they were left only with what they truly cared for: their families, their novias, their faith in God and their homeland. They now despised the world of fashionable clothes, nightclubs,

flirtatious girls, and idle living. They determined to take their work more seriously, to be more devout in their religious observances, and to dedicate more time to their families.

Nor did they intend to keep what they had learned to themselves. Many of them—especially Canessa, Paez, Sa-bella, Inciarte, Mangino, and Delgado—felt a sense of vocation to make use of their experience in some way. They felt touched by God and inspired by Him to teach others the lesson of love and self-sacrifice which their suffering had taught them. If the world had been shocked by the knowledge that they had eaten the bodies of their friends, this shock should be used to show the world just what it can mean to love one's neighbor as oneself.

There was only one rival, as it were, for the lesson which was to be drawn from the return of the sixteen survivors, and this was the Virgin of Garabandal, for whatever the opinions of their sons there remained that group of strong-minded women who had invoked her intercession and now felt that she had answered their prayers. They remembered when the skeptics had conceded that only a miracle could save the boys, and they were determined not to see their Virgin cheated of it just because it was susceptible to a rational explanation of a somewhat disagreeable nature. Indeed, they gripped the nettle of cannibalism with the thesis that the manna from heaven which had rained down upon the deserts of Sinai was but a euphemistic description for God's inspiration to the Jews to eat the bodies of their dead.

Twenty-nine of those who had left in the Fairchild had not returned, and for the families of those twenty-nine the re-

turn of the sixteen meant the confirmation of their death. It was, moreover, a confirmation of a disturbing nature. The Abals learned of the physical suffering of their son; the Nogueiras faced the mental agony of theirs. Every member of every family confronted the knowledge that their husbands, mothers, and sons were not only dead but might have been eaten.

It was a bitter admixture to hearts already brimful with sorrow, for however noble and rational the mind may have been in contemplation of this end, there was a primitive and irrepressible horror at the idea that the body of their beloved should have been used in this way. For the most part, however, they mastered this repugnance. The parents showed the same selflessness and courage as their sons had done and rallied around the sixteen survivors. Dr. Valeta, the father of Carlos, went with his family to the press conference and afterward spoke to the newspaper El Pais. "I came here with my family," he said, "because we wanted to see all those who were the friends of my son and because we are sincerely happy to have them back among us. We are glad, what is more, that there were forty-five of them, because this helped at least sixteen to return. I'd like to say, furthermore, that I knew from the very first moment what has been confirmed today. As a doctor I understood at once that no one could have survived in such a place and under such conditions without resort to courageous decisions. Now that I have confirmation of what has happened I repeat: Thank God that the forty-five were there, for sixteen homes have regained their children."

The father of Arturo Nogueira wrote a letter to the papers:

Dear Sirs:

These few words, written in obedience to what is in our hearts, want to pay tribute, with homage, admira-

tion, and recognition, to the sixteen heroes who survived the tragedy of the Andes. Admiration, because this is what we feel before the many proofs of solidarity, faith, courage, and serenity which they had to face and which they overcame. Recognition, profound and sincere, because of the care they gave in every moment to our dear son and brother Arturo up to the time of his death many days after the accident. We invite every citizen of our country to spend some minutes in meditation on the immense lesson of solidarity, courage, and discipline which has been left to us by these boys in the hope that it will serve us all to overcome our mean egotism and petty ambitions, and our lack of interest for our brothers.

The mothers showed similar courage. Some saw their dead sons in the survivors, for it was not difficult to understand that if their children had stayed alive and the others had died, the same thing would have happened; and that if all forty-five had survived the accident and avalanche, all forty-five would now be dead. They could imagine, too, the mental and physical anguish suffered by the survivors. All they wished now was that they should forget what they had been through. After all, it was not the sons or brothers or parents of their friends that they had eaten to survive. They had been already in heaven.

Most of the parents had resigned themselves to the death of their sons soon after the accident. There were some, however, who felt particularly cheated by fate. Estela Perez had believed quite as firmly as Madelon Rodriguez and Sarah and Rosina Strauch that Marcelo was alive, yet while their faith had been rewarded, hers had not. It was also a mean and bitter twist of fate that Senora Costemalle, whose other son had drowned off the coast of Carrasco and whose husband had died suddenly in Paraguay, should now have lost the last surviving member of her family.

The parents of Gustavo Nicolich were tormented by the knowledge that their son had lived for two weeks after

the accident. They also felt some animosity toward Gerard Croiset, Jr., who, they concluded, had sent them off on a false trail at a time when to continue toward the Tinguiririca and Sosneado mountains might have saved their son's life.

It was certainly true that the interpretation that had been put on Croiset's clairvoyance had misled the parents, but there were many things in what he had said which turned out to be true. He had seen some difficulty with officials over one of the boys' papers at Carrasco airport; there had been such an incident. He had said that the pilot was not flying the plane, and it was true that Lagurara, not Ferradas, was at the controls. The plane, he had said, lay like a worm with a crushed nose but no wings and the front door was half open. All this was true. Croiset had also accurately described the maneuvers which would be necessary for a pilot to see the wreck from the air, and he had said that the plane was near a sign reading danger and not far from a village with white Mexican-style houses. Though nothing of this sort was encountered by Parrado and Ca-nessa on their walk into Chile, a later expedition, from Argentina, to the site of the accident found in the vicinity a sign reading danger and a small village, Minas de Sominar, with white Mexican houses.

The landscape around the aircraft as described by Croiset—the three mountains, one without a top, and the lake—was found by the parents, but forty-one miles south of Planchon, whereas the Fairchild had crashed forty-one miles north of Planchon. The plane was not under a mountain, nor in or near a lake, nor had the pilot flown toward a lake to make a forced landing. The accident was not due to a blocked carburetor, as Croiset had said, nor was the pilot alone in the cabin, and whether or not he had indigestion could not be known. There were other details Croiset had given, when under pressure from the parents to supply them with more information, that seemed in retrospect to have

little relevance to the tragedy, but at least in giving them he had saved some of the mothers from despair.

The dreams of Senora Valeta also had been extraordinarily accurate, but the only extrasensory perception which events showed to be completely correct was that of the old water diviner whom Madelon's mother and Juan Jose Methol had visited in the impoverished Maronas district of Montevideo. He had pointed on a map to a spot nineteen miles from the spa of Termas del Flaco, which was exactly where the Fairchild was found to have come down. Remembering this, Juan Jose Methol went to find the old man and rewarded him with gifts of meat and money, which he in his turn shared with his impoverished neighbors.

An investigation into the causes of the accident was conducted by the air forces of both Uruguay and Chile. Both blamed the crash on the human error of the pilot, who had begun his descent toward Santiago when still in the middle of the Andes. The actual spot where the plane had crashed was nowhere near Curico. The mountain on which the boys had spent so many days lay on the Argentine side of the frontier, between the Cerro Sosneado and the Tinguiririca volcano. The fuselage had lain at about 11,500 feet; the mountain climbed by the expeditionaries was around 13,500 feet high. It was estimated that if the expeditionaries had followed the valley beyond the tail instead of climbing the mountain to the west, they would have come to a road in about three days (though the road which Canessa thought he saw as he climbed the mountain was almost certainly a geological fault). Only five miles to the east of the Fairchild there was a hotel which, though open only in the summer, was stocked with supplies of canned food.

The attempt to call help with the plane's radio, which in all had cost them more than two weeks on the mountain, could never have succeeded. The transmitter required 115 volts AC, normally supplied by an inverter. The current supplied by the batteries was 24 volts DC.

There was little in the way of a postmortem. Though some of the parents felt anger toward the Uruguayan Air Force for the incompetence of its pilots, it was not a moment in the political history of Uruguay to take on a branch of the armed forces. On the whole they accepted what had happened as the will of God and were grateful to Him for those who had returned, accepting the elevated view of what had happened which emanated from the survivors themselves.

Javier Methol, now that he was living at sea level, lost the dopiness which had afflicted him at the high altitude of the mountain. Like his former companions, he too believed that God had permitted them to survive for some purpose, and the first task he undertook was to make up to his children, insofar as he could, for the loss of their mother. He went to live with Liliana's mother and father, who had, as he had known they would, taken care of his children. Reunited with them, Javier was almost content, for though he continued to miss Liliana he knew that she was happy in heaven.

One evening in Punta del Este, he went walking along the beach with his three-year-old daughter, Marie Noel. She was skipping along at his side, chattering all the time, when suddenly she stopped and looked up at him.

"Papa," she said. "You came back from heaven, didn't you? But when is Mama coming back?"

Javier crouched down to the level of his little daughter and said to her, "You must try and understand, Marie Noel, that Mama is so nice, so very nice, that God needs her in heaven. She is so important that now she is living with God."

On January 18, 1973, ten members of the Andean Rescue Corps, together with Freddy Bernales of the SAR, Lieutenant Enrique Crosa of the Uruguayan Air Force, and a Catholic priest, Father Ivan Caviedes, were flown in helicopters to the wreck of the Fairchild. There they pitched camp, intending to spend some days on the mountain, and set about gathering up the remains of the dead. They climbed to the top of the mountain to recover those bodies which had remained there and had now been uncovered by the melting of the snow.

A spot was found about half a mile from the site of the accident which was sheltered from possible avalanches and had enough earth to make a grave. Here they buried those bodies which were still intact and all the remains of those which were not. A rough stone altar was built beside the grave, and over it was placed an iron cross about three feet high. The cross was painted orange and on one side of it in black was the inscription "The World to Its Uruguayan Brothers," while on the other side were painted the words "Nearer, O God, to Thee."

After saying mass, Father Caviedes made an address to the men who had assisted at the ceremony. Then the Andin-ists returned to the hulk of the Fairchild, splashed it with gasoline, and set it on fire. The plane burned quickly in the strong wind, and as soon as they were sure that it was properly alight the Chileans prepared to leave. The silence of the mountains had been broken all too frequently by the rumble of avalanches, and they judged it too dangerous to stay.

(Continued from front Hap)

The hardiest were chosen as expedition-aries. A sleeping bag was sewn for them and snowshoes made from the seats of the airplane. They were given sunglasses made out of the dead pilots' plastic folder. Seventy days after the crash, two of the young men reached help. Their ten-day trek out of the majestic but hostile mountain range—an almost impossible feat for even a skilled mountaineer—saved the lives of their fourteen remaining friends.

The survivors selected Piers Paul Read to write their exclusive story, and he is the only one who has been given a complete account of the events described here. Remarkably candid, filled with suspense, his book describes in dramatic detail the boys' day-to-day struggle for life on the mountain— and their parents' attempts to find them even after all reasonable hope had gone. Alive is a heartbreaking and inspiring work that re-creates one of the greatest survival stories of our times.

PIERS PAUL READ'S novels have earned him acclaim throughout the world, winning for him the Somerset Maugham Award and other prizes. In addition to Alive, his first nonfiction book, Mr. Read is the author of The Upstart, Monk Dawson, The Professor s Daughter, and two other works of fiction. He lives in London with his wife and two children.

The photograph on the hack panel is copyright by Gamma.

J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY

Philadelphia and New York

ISBN:0-397-01001-X