4 children including a baby miraculously survive air crash in Amazon rainforest
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Bogot, Colombia: More than two weeks after a plane crashed in Columbian Amazon, four children including an 11-month-old baby have been found alive.
President Gustavo Petro of Columbia on Wednesday shared the news on Twitter declaring ‘joy for the country,' news agency AFP reported.
More than 100 soldiers and sniffer dogs were searching for the children in the dense forest where wild animals roam amid trees that can grow up to 40 metres.
The airplane that crashed on May 1 killed three adults, and the surviving four children of a dead woman passenger had to fend for themselves.
Ranoque Mucutuy, the mother of the four children, belongs to the Huitoto ethnicity, which is facing exploitation, disease and assimilation reducing its population over the years.
The plane, the reason for whose crash has not found, was flying from a jungle location to San Jose del Guaviare, a main city in Amazon rainforest in Columbia.
Minutes after the pilot reported problems with the engine the airplane disappeared from the radar, according to Colombia’s disaster response body.
The children including a11-month-old, a 13, 9 and 4 years old had been wandering in the forest in the ‘southern Caqueta department since crash’.
Rescuers involved in the ‘Operation Hope’ intensified efforts after they came across an improvised shelter built with sticks and branches in the forest.
The findings gave them hope that there were survivors in the crash.
Previously they found a baby’s drinking bottle, half eaten fruit and scissors, hair tie among branches.
Rescuers on Monday and Tuesday found bodies of the pilot and two adults.’
One of three helicopters used in the search ‘blasted out’ a message from children’s grandmother in the Huitoto language telling them stop wandering through the jungle.
The children belonging to the Huitoto ethnicity survived the hardship because of their hunting, fishing and gathering skills.
