Mark and Anne have had a series of memorable experiences in Argentina, from attending television premieres to walking with penguins, it's been fun. But maybe one of the most memorable things has been meeting Dr. and Mrs. Canessa. This blog mentioned once before that Anne, Mark and the HBomb had the opportunity to meet up with the survivors of the Andes plane crash accident during their annual reunion in Uruguay. This opportunity came to us because our friend, the Texas spitfire, is friends with Dr. Roberto Canessa, pediatric cardiologist, former Uruguayan rugby national team member, and crash survivor.
Mark and Anne had the opportunity to spend most of the day with Dr. Canessa when he and his wife Laura came to town last month, including lunch, an afternoon reception at the Ambassador's residence and then the better part of the evening at a tango show at La Esquina Carlos Gardel (nice place, good show, a bit touristy).
Dr. Canessa was convinced by the Texas Spitfire to give a talk about his experiences and views on life. In addition to practicing medicine, Dr. Canessa is also an occasional public speaker. So, with the aide of a brief film and a narrative from his wife, Laura, Dr. Canessa regaled a standing room only crowd with the story of his harrowing experiences during and following the accident.
Dr. Canessa's speech started with his memories of the accident itself, as he tried to convey what it was like when he realized that the plane was going down. Then, after the crash, when he looked around and saw so many of his friends and teammates who did not survive the crash. He described trying to hold the group together initially as they waited for rescue and the despair they all felt when they heard over the radio that the search for them had been called off. This was followed a day or so later by an avalanche that killed several more of the survivors. He detailed how the group argued about what strategy to pursue to survive, and how they arrived at the decision they made.
Realizing that help was not on the way and that they were in a barren, frozen no man's land in late winter, the group resolved to send the healthiest remaining members on a mission to find help. They had the maps that the pilot was using and would try to use them to get to civilization. Dr. Canessa admitted that he did not actually want to be one of the two people who walked down the mountain in search of help. He thought that anyone who went on that walk would die. He fought the others who pushed the idea of leaving right away, as he believed they needed to wait for warmer weather. This whole time, the people around him continued to languish and die of disease, injuries sustained in the crash, exposure and starvation. Eventually, Dr. Canessa decided, in his words, that "I would rather die walking."
So he and Fernando Parrado started the trek. They walked for 10 days in freezing temperatures. He said that the cold ceased to bother him on his skin, but he started to feel it in his bones. After 10 days, they found a creek on the edge of the snowline and followed it. The creek widened to a river. Eventually, they found a farmer, but he was on the other side of the now rushing river. They yelled for help from the farmer, but he couldn't hear what they were saying. Somehow, though, the farmer decided to return the next day to make sure they were ok. This was 72 days after the plane crashed in the mountains.
Dr. Canessa recently published his account of what happened in a book called "I Had to Survive." We asked him why he decided to write it. He didn't need the money, other people had written books, made movies, etc, why go through the effort now? He said that there some things that he thought should be told from a different point of view (some individuals are portrayed in other tellings in ways that Dr. Canessa felt were not accurate). He also wanted to use his story to help his patients and their families. The narrative of overcoming long odds can be helpful for families with babies undergoing heart surgery in the nursery or in utero. And thirdly, he said with a wry smile, that he was tired of signing books written about him by other authors.
Wow. Fascinating.
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