Carlos Paez: Inside 1972 Andes plane crash survivors’ life
THE man of the iron spirit spent 72 days in the Andes with the remaining 15 survivors following a plane crash.
Carlos Paez, 70, had to celebrate his birthday on a mountain in a frigid temperature as he fought to stay alive.
Who is Carlos Paez?
Carlos “Carlitos” Miguel Paez Rodrigues, also known as “the man of the iron spirit”, is one of the 16 survivors of the Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571.
He was only 18 years old at the time of the crash and turned 19 during his 72-days ordeal in the mountains.
Paez claimed that the catastrophe caught him completely off guard.
He said: “I was an 18-year-old boy, the son of a famous painter who gave us everything. I still had a nanny – she packed my suitcase for the trip.
“I had never been cold. I had never been hungry. I had never done anything useful. And I lived the most incredible survival story of all time.”
What happened during the Andes plane crash of 1972?
Uruguayan Air force flight 571 was a chartered plane of a Fairchild FH-227D on route from Montevideo, Uruguay to Santiago, Chile.
The flight was chartered to take the members of the amateur Old Christians Club rugby team to a match with an English team, Old Boys Club.
It took off from Carrasco International Airport on October 12, 1972.
Due to bad weather, the flight touched down early in Mendoza, Argentina where the team stayed overnight.
It took off from Mendoza on Friday, October 13 as the rugby squad made fun of the date’s unfortunate significance.
An hour into the flight, an inexperienced co-pilot failed to notice that the plane was 43miles away from the city where they were supposed to land.
Lieutenant-Colonel Dante Héctor Lagurara initiated the plane’s descent, unaware of the fact that they were still flying over the Andes.
As the plane descended it struck a mountain and both the wings were sheared off. What remained of it slid down a glacier at 220mph for 2,379ft before it smashed into ice.
On board there were 45 people, including the crew, friends, family, and team, as well as a stranger who had purchased a seat to attend a wedding.
Three crew members and nine passengers died immediately after the crash.
Another 17 died from injuries and suffocation due to an avalanche that occurred days later.
After 10 days, the remaining survivors learned from a radio on the plane that the search had been called off.
They would have to endure 72 days of extreme hardships, including starvation, freezing temperatures and avalanches.
The survivors had to resort to cannibalism to stay alive.
Paez said of the experience: “Of course, the idea of eating human flesh was terrible, repugnant. It was hard to put in your mouth.
“But we got used to it. In a sense, our friends were some of the first organ donors in the world – they helped to nourish us and kept us alive.”
Other survivors made a pact that those who lived could eat who had died due to the exposure.
He said: “We promised each other that if one of us died, the others were obliged to eat their bodies”
They were rescued after Nando Parrado and Roberto Canessa had set off on a 10-day trekking journey in the mountains to find help and stumbled upon a shepherd.
Who was Carlos Paez father Carlos Paez Vilaro?
Carlos Paez Vilaro was an Uruguayan abstract artist, writer and composer, best known for his colourful murals and paintings.
His love for the culture of black Uruguayans would inspire much of his life’s work.
He championed Uruguayan Candombe music and dance, which were socially unacceptable in 1940s, and erased the stigma around it.
He was also one of the Grupo de los 8, a movement of Uruguayan artists formed in 1958 to promote new tendencies in painting.
Vilaro never gave up hope to find his son after the plane crash in 1972 and was actively involved in the search.
The renowned artist died at the age of 90 on February 24, 2014.
Where is Carlos Paez now?
Paez, now a grandfather of five, travels the world as a motivational speaker telling his story.
The survivor said that he felt it was his duty to share his story, how he endured the freezing conditions and how he endured eating his friends’ corpses.
He said: “I’m condemned to tell this story forever more, just like the Beatles always having to sing Yesterday.”
He is also an Agricultural Technician with a degree from Universidad del Trabajo del Uruguay and ten years in the field.
In 2003, he published a book After 10 Day which gained an immense success with more than 18 editions to date.
Carlos Paez Rodrigues made a cameo appearance in a Netflix film, Society of the Snow.
Paez played his very own father who read the names of the survivors out loud to be transmitted through the radio.