After 40 days, the four children who disappeared in the Colombian jungle after a small plane accident were miraculously found alive.
The news was announced by Colombian President Gustavo Petro on Twitter on Friday local time.
Petro added:
the children were found by a rescue dog.
Colombia's Ministry of Defense said the brothers, ages 13, 9, 4 and 1, were rescued from the rainforest by an Air Force helicopter. The minors, who are from the Uitoto indigenous tribe, are first taken to San Jose del Guaviaré to the local hospital. The Uitotos are an indigenous people living in southeastern Colombia and northern Peru.
The children were traveling in the small Cessna 206 plane that crashed on May 1, presumably due to engine failure, with seven passengers on board in the jungle between Araracuara, Amazonas province, and San José del Guaviare, Guaviare province.
The wreckage of the plane and the bodies of the pilot, mother and a driver were found, but the children were missing.
Based on media reports, the brothers traveled to visit their father, who had to flee home after being constantly threatened by a breakaway group of the FARC guerrilla organization.
According to the army, rescue teams found the children in a weakened state about five kilometers west of the accident site.
Three Air Force helicopters also joined the rescue operation called Remény. On board one of them, a speaker "capable of covering an area of approximately 1,500 meters" broadcast a message recorded by the children's grandmother.
The woman told her grandchildren in the language of the local tribe that they were looking for them and asked them to stay where they were.
(MTI/dpa/AFP/AP)
Featured image: AFP / Colombian Presidential Office
