Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors

by Piers Paul Read

  Once the four expeditionaries had been chosen, they became a warrior class whose special obligations entitled them to special privileges. They were allowed anything which might improve their condition in body or mind. They ate more meat than the others and chose which pieces they preferred. They slept where, how, and for as long as they liked. They were no longer expected to share the everyday work of cutting meat and cleaning the plane, though Parrado and, to a lesser extent, Canessa continued to do so. And just as their bodies were coddled, so were their minds. Prayers were said at night for their health and well-being and all conversation in their hearing was of an optimistic nature. If Methol thought that the plane was in the middle of the Andes, he would make sure not to say so to an expeditionary. If ever their position was discussed with them, Chile was only a mile or two away on the other side of the mountain.

  It was inevitable, perhaps, that the four should to some extent take advantage of their favoured position and that this should provoke resentment. Sabella had to sacrifice his second pair of trousers to Canessa; Francois had only one pair of socks while Vizintín had six. Pieces of fat which had been carefully scavenged from the snow by some hungry boy would be requisitioned by Canessa, saying, ‘I need it to build up my strength, and if I don’t build up my strength you’ll never get out of here.’ Parrado took no advantage of his position, however; nor did Turcatti. Both worked as hard as they had done before and showed the same calm, affection, and optimism.

  The expeditionaries were not the leaders of the group but a caste apart, separated from the others by their privileges and preoccupations. They might have evolved into an oligarchy had not their powers been checked by the triumvirate of the Strauch cousins. Of all the subgroups of friends and relatives that had existed before the avalanche, theirs was the only one to survive intact. The gang of younger boys had lost Nicolich and Storm; Canessa had lost Maspons; Nogueira had lost Platero; Methol had lost his wife. Gone too was Marcelo, the leader they had inherited from the outside world.

  The closeness of the relationship between Fito and Eduardo Strauch and Daniel Fernández gave them an immediate advantage over all the others in withstanding not the physical but the mental suffering caused by their isolation in the mountains. They also possessed those qualities of realism and practicality which were of much more use in their brutal predicament than the eloquence of Pancho Delgado or the gentle nature of Coche Inciarte. The reputation which they had gained, especially Fito, in the first week for facing up to unpalatable facts and making unpleasant decisions had won the respect of those whose lives had thereby been saved. Fito, who was the youngest of the three, was the most respected, not just for his judicious opinions but for the way in which he had supervised the rescue of those trapped in the avalanche at the moment of greatest hysteria. His realism, together with his strong faith in their ultimate salvation, led many of the boys to pin their hopes on him, and Carlitos and Roy suggested that he be made leader in place of Marcelo. But Fito refused this crown they offered him. There was no need to institutionalize the influence of the Strauch cousins.

  Of all the work that had to be done, cutting meat off the bodies of their dead friends was the most difficult and unpleasant, and this was done by Fito, Eduardo and Daniel Fernández. It was a ghastly task which even those as tough as Parrado or Vizintín could not bring themselves to perform. The corpses had first to be dug out of the snow, then thawed in the sun. The cold preserved them just as they had been at the moment of death. If the eyes remained open, they would close them, for it was hard to cut into a friend Under his glassy gaze, however sure they were that the soul had long since departed.

  The Strauchs and Fernández, often helped by Zerbino, would cut large pieces of meat from the body; these would then be passed to another team, which would divide the chunks into smaller pieces with razor blades. This work was not so unpopular for once the meat was separated from the bodies it was easier to forget what it was.

  The meat was strictly rationed, and this again was done by the two Strauchs and Daniel Fernández. The ‘basic ration which was given out at midday was a small handful, perhaps half a pound, but it was agreed that those who worked could have more, because they used up energy through their exertions, and that the expeditionaries could have almost as much as they liked. One corpse was always finished before another was started.

  They had, from necessity, come to eat almost every part of the body. Canessa knew that the liver contained the reserve of vitamins; for that reason he ate it himself and encouraged others to do so until it was set aside for the expeditionaries. Having overcome their revulsion against eating the liver, it was easier to move on to the heart, kidneys and intestines. It was less extraordinary for them to do this than it might have been for a European or a North American, because it was common in Uruguay to eat the intestines and the lymphatic glands of a steer at an asado. The sheets of fat which had been cut from the body were dried in the sun until a crust formed, and then they were eaten by everyone. It was a source of energy and, though not as popular as the meat, was outside the rationing, as were the odd pieces of earlier carcasses which had been left around in the snow and could be scavenged by anyone. This helped fill the stomachs of those who were hungry, for it was only the expeditionaries who ever ate their fill of the meat. The others felt a continuous craving for more, yet realized how important it was that what they had should be rationed. Only the lungs, the skin, the head and the genitals of the corpses were thrown aside.

  These were the rules, but there arose outside the rules an unofficial system of pilfering tolerated by the Strauchs. This was why the task of cutting up the larger pieces became popular; every now and then a sliver could be popped into one’s mouth. Everyone who worked at cutting up the meat did it, even Fernández and the Strauchs, and no one said anything so long as it did not go too far. One piece in the mouth for every ten cut up for the others was more or less normal. Mangino sometimes brought the proportion down to one for every five or six and Páez to one for three, but they would not hide what they did and desisted when the others shouted at them.

  This system, like a good constitution, was fair in theory and flexible enough to allow for the weakness of human nature, but the burden fell on those who either could not or would not work. Echavarren and Nogueira were trapped in the plane by their broken, swollen, septic and gangrenous legs, and only occasionally could they drag themselves down from their hammock and crawl out to defecate or to melt snow for drinking water. There was no question of their cutting up meat or scavenging in the snow. Delgado, too, had a broken leg, and Inciarte’s leg was septic. Methol was still hampered by his altitude sickness. Francois and Roy Harley were also crippled to some extent, not in their limbs but in their will; they could have worked but the shock of the crash or, in Roy’s case, the shock of the avalanche followed by the abortive trial expedition seemed to have destroyed all sense of purpose. They simply sat in the sun.

  The workers felt little compassion for those they thought of as parasites. In such extreme conditions lethargy seemed criminal. Vizintín thought that those who did not work should be given nothing to eat until they did. The others realized they had to keep their companions alive but saw no reason to do much more. They were harsh, too, in their assessment of the malingerers’ condition. Some thought that Nogueira’s legs were not broken and that he only imagined the pain he felt. They also thought that Delgado exaggerated the pain of his fractured femur. Mangino, after all, had broken his leg too, yet managed to work at cutting up meat. They had little respect for Methol’s altitude sickness or Francois’s frozen feet. The result was that the only supplement to the ration for the ‘parasites’ were the cells of their own bodies.

  Some of the boys continued to find it difficult to eat raw human flesh. While the others extended the limit of what they could stomach to the liver, heart, kidneys and intestines of the dead, Inciarte, Harley and Turcatti still balked at the red meat of the muscles. The only occasions on which they found it eas
y to eat was when the meat was cooked; and every morning Inciarte would look across to Páez, who was in charge of this department, and ask, ‘Carlitos, are we cooking today?’

  Carlitos would reply, ‘I don’t know; it depends on the wind,’ for they could only light a fire if the weather was fair. But there were other factors involved. The supply of wood was limited; when they had used up all the Coca-Cola crates, there were only thin strips of wood which made up part of the wall of the plane. There was also Canessa’s argument that proteins died at a high temperature and Fernández’s that frying the meat made it shrink so that there was less to be eaten. Thus, cooking was allowed once or twice a week as the weather permitted, and on those occasions the less fastidious would hold back so that the others could eat more.

  3

  During the ten days between their choice of the four expeditionaries and November 15, when they hoped the cold weather would come to an end, the nineteen survivors developed both as a group and as individuals.

  Parrado, for example, who before the accident had been a gawky, timid, would-be playboy, was now a hero. His courage, strength, and unselfishness made him the best loved of them all. He was always the most determined to brave the mountains and the cold and set out for civilization; and for this reason those who were younger, weaker, or had less determination placed all their faith in him. He also comforted them when they cried and took on himself much of the humdrum work around the plane from which, as an expeditionary, he was officially excused. He would never suggest a course of action without rising at the same time to put it into effect. One night, when part of the wall blew down in a strong wind, it was Parrado who climbed out from under the blankets to build it up again. When he returned he was so cold that those sleeping on either side of him had to punch and massage his body to bring back the circulation; but when, half an hour later, the wall blew down again, Parrado once again rose to rebuild it.

  He only showed two areas of weakness. The first lay in his determination to get out. If he had had his own way he would have left straight after the avalanche with no proper preparation. He was patient with others but impatient with circumstances; he was unable to make the kind of detached assessment of the situation that came from Fito Strauch. If they had let him leave when he wanted to, he would not have survived.

  His other failing was the irritation aroused in him by Roy Harley. It exasperated him that someone who was physically fit and strong should always be in tears; and yet others who were brought down in a similar way by the misery of their situation found Parrado their chief source of comfort. He was simple, warm, fair-minded, optimistic and good-tempered. He rarely, if ever, swore and was most popular as a sleeping companion.

  Next to Parrado, Numa Turcatti was the most generally beloved of the boys. He had a small, muscular body which from the first he had put to the service of their common cause. The expeditions prior to the avalance had weakened him, and when Algorta had walked with him up to the wing he noticed that Numa no longer showed the same vigour. Also, his aversion to raw meat continued. Since he had known few of the boys before leaving Montevideo, it was proof of his strength, simplicity and complete lack of malice that he became so loved and respected by them. They all felt that if he and Parrado undertook an expedition it would succeed.

  The other two expeditionaries did not inspire the same affection. It was recognized that Canessa had had good ideas, such as making the blankets and the hammocks which had done much to improve the conditions inside the plane. He knew about proteins and vitamins and had been a strong advocate of eating the flesh of the dead bodies. On the other hand his medical reputation, which had been so high at the time of his operation on Platero, had suffered after he had lanced one of the boils on Inciarte’s leg and the infection had worsened as a result.

  It was Canessa’s personality, however, which made him difficult to live with. He was nervous and tense, bursting into bad temper at the smallest provocation, screaming imprecations and abuse in his high-pitched voice. Spasmodically brave and unselfish, he was more often impatient and stubborn. His nickname, Muscles, had been given him not just because of his physical strength but for this stubbornness of mind. On the rugby field it meant idiosyncratic play; in the plane it meant that he walked all over the sleeping bodies of his companions, pushing himself in wherever he chose. He did what he liked and no one could stop him. Only Parrado had some influence over him. The Strauchs might have exercised some control, but they did not want to antagonize an expeditionary.

  Vizintín was not as assertive and domineering as Canessa, but he was even more self-centred and did not have the compensating qualities of inventiveness and ingenuity. He had courage, as he had demonstrated on the trial expedition, but back in the plane his behaviour was spoiled and childish. He quarrelled with everyone, especially Inciarte and Algorta, and the only work he did was to melt snow for himself and do a few odd jobs that interested him; he made mittens for all the expeditionaries out of seat covers, and he made several pairs of sunglasses. At night he cried for his mother.

  Only Canessa had any kind of control over Vizintín, but Mangino liked him. It was as if the three touchiest and most aggressive boys – each nineteen – had formed a small union. Mangino felt isolated; he too, like Turcatti, had not known many of the boys before and felt no restraint now at telling them to go to hell. In the days just following the accident he had been selfish and hysterical, but he came to work more for the group than most, in spite of his broken leg, and some of the other boys – notably Canessa and Eduardo Strauch – felt protective towards him.

  Bobby Francois was another case where youth was deemed to excuse his shortcomings, the foremost of which was his lethargy. It was as if he had been born without an instinct for self-preservation; from the moment of the accident when he had sat down in the snow and lit a cigarette with the nonchalant remark, ‘We’ve had it,’ he had behaved as if survival was not worth the effort. He had been a lazy boy before they had left – his nickname was Fatty – but here sloth was suicidal, and had he been left to himself he would certainly have died. He did not work. He would sit in the sun and melt snow for water when he was forced to; otherwise he sat rubbing his feet, which had been badly frozen in the avalanche. At night, when his blanket fell away from his body, he could not summon up the energy to cover himself again; someone else had to do it. At one point Daniel Fernández had to massage his feet to stop them from becoming gangrenous.

  There came a time when the cousins were so infuriated by Bobby’s lethargy that they thought they would force him to work. They therefore told him that if he did not work he would get nothing to eat. Bobby merely shrugged his shoulders, looked mournfully up at them with his lovely large eyes, and said, ‘Yes, that’s fair enough.’ But that morning he did as little as before, and when it came to midday and the distribution of food he did not take his plate and join the queue. He seemed indifferent as to whether he lived or died and quite satisfied that the others should make the decision for him. They were not prepared to do so. Their ‘incentive’ had failed. Bobby got his ration anyway.

  Of the boys who were older and strong, Eduardo Strauch was like Parrado, kind to those who were young and weak: to Mangino, Francois and Moncho Sabella. Though uninjured, Moncho was weaker than most of the others and had a nervous nature. He had done well at the time of the accident – Nicolich considered that he had saved his life – and would have liked to prove himself the equal of all in courage and hard work, but he did not have the strength. He became one of the chorus who sat back in the sun, smoking, chatting, and melting snow, while others took the centre of the stage.

  Javier Methol, too, was one of the chorus. He was always dazed from the altitude sickness which continued to affect him. He talked a lot but stuttered and never finished his sentences. The boys, who were all at least ten years younger than he was, tended to regard him as a figure of fun. They called him Dumbo, because he had told them that this had been his nickname as a child, and laughed at him as he wal
ked ponderously over the snow. They played practical jokes on him, in which he joined, exaggerating his condition because he knew it amused the boys and kept up their spirits. For example, one of their number would pretend that he had never eaten a cream bun (ensaimada), whereupon Methol would embark on a lengthy and pedantic description.

  Just as he was reaching the end, a second boy would come up to him and say, ‘What are you talking about, Dumbo?’

  ‘I’m describing a cream bun.’

  ‘A cream bun? What’s that?’

  ‘You don’t know? Well, it’s round, about this size …’ and he would embark on a second description. Just as he reached the end of that a third boy would arrive and also pretend that he had never eaten a cream bun.

  Methol’s speciality was scraping oil off pieces of fat and collecting it as a laxative. He was also responsible for sharpening the knives, either on other knives or on pieces of rock. He made sunglasses, first for Canessa and then for himself, from plastic materials that were salvaged from the pilots’ cabin. It was noticed, when he was doing this, that he only cut one lens from the plastic. This was the first intimation the boys had that he could only see out of one eye.

  He would comfort the boys when they were unhappy. So too would Coche Inciarte, who was parallel with Parrado and Turcatti in the affections of the group. Parrado and Turcatti, however, were expeditionaries and so somewhat aloof, whereas Coche could understand their weaknesses because he was weak himself. He had done some work until his leg became infected, but later did nothing. He did not mind the smaller ration, because he did not like the meat when it was raw. He never grappled with their critical situation but spent the day dreaming of his life in Montevideo. Though the others were often exasperated by his inactivity, they all liked him too much to be angry. He had a most open and honest personality: kind, gentle, soft-spoken and witty. No one would avoid his candid, smiling eyes, even if the object of their glance was to bum a cigarette or an extra piece of meat.