 |
|
Maria Nelly Murillo flown
out to Medellin, Colombia for medical treatment on Thursday. AP
|
The memory of Maria Nelly Murillo's mother and her own
maternal instinct kept her going for five days as she fought to save her baby
after their plane crashed in the Colombian jungle.
Murillo and her
eight-month-old son Yudier Moreno made headlines around the world when they
were found alive deep in the jungle five days after the small twin-engine plane
transporting them crashed in northwestern Colombia.
"I just thought of
my mom and my son," according to Red Cross volunteer Acisclo Renteria on
Thursday quoted the 18-year-old mother as saying.
Renteria found them on
Wednesday, the last planned day of the search and rescue operation in a remote
area of Colombia's Choco region.
AFP report continues:
The crash killed pilot
Carlos Mario Ceballos, the only other person aboard the plane, which was
carrying a cargo of fish and coconuts but also served as an air taxi across the
remote region.
Ceballos was crushed by
the 225 kilograms (500 pounds) of fish he was transporting, said Renteria.
But Murillo and her baby,
who were sitting in the back of the Cessna 303, somehow survived. She managed
to get out the plane's door as it burned and hurry to safety with her son.
Renteria, 38, and three
other rescuers found Murillo sleeping beside her baby near a ravine where they
had sought shelter in the thick Alto Baudo jungle.
She had first- and
second-degree burns, a gash on her foot and a sprained ankle, but was very much
alive.
Her baby escaped with his
clothes slightly charred but no apparent injuries, said Renteria.
"'Help! Help!' was
the first thing she said when she saw us," said the rescue worker, who has
volunteered with the Red Cross for 15 years.
"I said, 'Stay calm,
sweetie,' because she was trying to stand up and couldn't. She asked me for
food and water," he told AFP.
"The baby was cold,
so I bundled him up in my shirt. He cried when I picked him up, but I gave him
saline solution and he calmed down. After that, he slept in my arms the whole
time."
A picture of Renteria
with baby Yudier in his arms, wearing a harness aboard the helicopter that
transported them to the regional capital Quibdo, was published in newspapers
worldwide.
The news drew a powerful
reaction in Colombia.
"It's a miracle. It
is a very wild area and it was a catastrophic accident," Colonel Hector
Carrascal, commander of the Colombian Air Force in Antioquia department, told
AFP.
"His mother's spirit
must have given him strength to survive," he said of the baby.
90 failed phone
calls
Murillo hails from the
region where the crash occurred.
The plane went down
halfway between the town of Nuqui and Quibdo, a half-hour flight that locals
often make by air taxi in this region where rivers are the only
"roads" through the thick tropical forest.
Murillo managed to
survive drinking river water and eating some food she had with her.
"She told me the
only thing she did wrong was to stray from the crash site, because afterward
she wanted to go back for the fish, but she got lost. But when she realized the
pilot was dead, she got scared and wanted to get out of there," said
Renteria.
When she exited the
plane, she realized her baby was extremely hot and managed to find a pool of
water to cool him off, he said.
Later, when the flames
had died down, she returned to the aircraft to get a machete and a coconut.
"She found her cell
phone and the pilot's. But one had no battery left and the other had no credit
to make calls. Neither one worked," said Renteria.
Murillo tried to place a
call more than 90 times, but was unable, according to local media reports.
In the end, she decided
to leave and seek help, hoping to cross paths with a local miner.
She spent five days in the
jungle, breastfeeding her son until it hurt, said Renteria -- who proudly
revealed Murillo had asked him to be the boy's godfather.
Murillo and her baby were
undergoing medical checks at a hospital in second city Medellin.
Authorities are still
investigating what caused the crash.
No comments:
Post a Comment