Lost and alone in one of the most remote corners of the extensive tropical forests of Brazil, at least Antonio Sena knew what he feared most: “the great predators of the Amazon: jaguars, crocodiles and the anacondas. ”
But to the pilot of 36 years not only worried about being the next meal of a lethal animal. He had to find food, water and shelter.
It was a terrifying task and he feared that after his plane crash, it would take days to rescue him.
What Antonio did not suspect was that he would fight to survive, hungry and alone, for more than a month.
Forced landing
“Mayday, mayday, mayday … Dad, Tango, India, Romeo, Juliet is falling …”. Thus began Antonio’s last radio message.
The plane in which he was flying alone, in January, on a trip to refuel a remote mine, had serious problems.
“Engine stopped suddenly at 900 meters. I had to make a forced landing in the middle of the jungle “, Antonio told the BBC.
Crashing into tree branches, the pilot miraculously managed to lower his Cessna plane in an uninhabited area north of the Amazon River.
Antonio had escaped death, but his problems were just beginning. The fuel had spilled all over the fuselage of the aircraft.
“ I had to leave the plane because he knew that the situation was very dangerous “, he pointed out.
Antonio remained near the aircraft hoping that his last message I would have been heard and help was on the way.
“I collected everything that could help me survive a few days in the jungle,” he recalled.
“At that time I imagined that I would have to be there between five to eight days, the usual time for a search and rescue operation “.
But a week passed and the help did not arrive.
Leaving alone
Antonio decided that if he wanted to see his loved ones again, he would have I would have to leave the scene of the accident and try to walk to a safe place.
“I realized that I would have to find a way to get out of that place.”
The pilot took advantage of the first light of dawn to undertake his desperate attempt to find the nearest inhabited area.
“I decided to walk east, towards the sun, and I walked every morning around two and four hours “.
” After that, I had to plan the night: build my shelter and light a campfire. ”
The Amazon is a dangerous place for anyone who finds himself there suddenly alone, without any type of transportation or communication. But Antonio had learned some skills that would give him a chance to survive.
“I completed a jungle survival course due to my work in aviation.”
” Also, I was born and lived in the Amazon. ”
Antonio had also taken the time to learn from people who live in remote areas of the rainforest, information that could now mean the difference between life and death.
“Every time I had the opportunity, I would talk to the people who lived there. You can learn many things from them. ”
Finding food
To find food, Antonio sought help from the local fauna.
“There was a fruit that I had never seen in my life, but I observed that monkeys used to eat it, “he said.
” And I thought that if monkeys could eat it, I could too “.
Antonio also found cocoa a few times, but he needed to find something more than fruit.
The answer?
“ Eggs of ostrich , a very common bird in the middle of the jungle.”
This bird lays a “big blue egg” that Antonio occasionally managed to find.
“Eggs are eggs. It’s protein and I needed it at the time, so I ate it raw. ”
Avoiding predators
Although Antonio managed find enough food to stay (barely) alive, it also had to avoid becoming lunch for some of the biggest inhabitants of the Amazon.
“Every time I built my shelter I did it on top of the hills “, he explained.
“And the reason is that jaguars, crocodiles and anacondas have a great relationship with water, so I never camped next to a water source. ”
Antonio too was careful to make a lot of noise while walking through the jungle .
I knew that during the day I was more likely to be attacked by an animal that had suddenly become frightened.
Hope at last
Even though Antonio’s survival skills were working, he had lost a lot of weight.
It had been weeks since he left the wreckage of his plane .
But after 36 days he finally ran into a small group of people.
“After all this time to walk and climb and climb hills and cross rivers, I found a group of chestnut pickers in an isolated area “, he said.
Unable After seeing them at first, the pilot located them by the noise they made.
“I could hear them working.”
Antonio’s hard experience was coming to its end.
“The only thing that motivated me and gave me strength to continue, even with pain and hunger, was the will to see her again. my family“.
“When I finally left the jungle and my family met me at the airport, that was the best moment of my life for me.”
After the accident, planes and helicopters had been sent to look for the pilot, but the operation had been abandoned weeks before.
If Antonio had not succeeded leaving the jungle by himself, the plane crash would have meant that he would never have returned to see his family.
“I was finally able to hug them and tell them how much I love them,” Antonio told the BBC.
“I did all that just for them, thinking of them every time, every time.”
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