Global Courant
Four children from an indigenous community in Colombia have been found alive in the south of the country more than five weeks after the plane they were traveling in crashed into dense jungle, Colombia’s president Gustavo Petro said Friday.
The children were rescued by the army near the border between the Colombian provinces of Caqueta and Guaviare, near the spot where the small plane had crashed.
The plane — a Cessna 206 — was carrying seven people on a route between Araracuara, in Amazonas province, and San Jose del Guaviare, a town in Guaviare province, when it issued an emergency warning for engine failure in the early hours of May 1. .
Three adults, including the pilot, died as a result of the crash and their bodies were found on the plane. The four children aged 13, nine and four, as well as an 11-month-old baby, survived the impact.
Photos shared by the Colombian military showed a group of soldiers with the four children in the middle of the jungle.
A soldier stands next to the wreckage of a plane in the jungle of Caqueta, Colombia, on May 19. (Colombian Armed Forces/Reuters)
“A joy for the whole country! The four children who got lost… in the Colombian jungle seemed alive,” Petro said in a post on Twitter.
Petro initially tweeted that children had been found on May 17, but later deleted the post, saying the information was unconfirmed.
“They were together, they are weak, let’s let the doctors evaluate them. They found them, it makes me very happy,” Petro told journalists on Friday, adding that the children had defended themselves alone in the middle of the jungle .
Rescue workers, supported by search dogs, had previously found discarded fruit that the children ate to survive, as well as makeshift shelters made with jungle vegetation.
Planes and helicopters from the Army and Air Force of Colombia participated in the rescue operations.
