By rights, hitting a snow-covered mountain at 500 mph in a plane should have killed Eduardo Strauch and his friends almost instantly.
Miraculously, the architect escaped relatively unscathed from the accident that occurred in a remote area of the Andes in South America in 1972.
However, that was just the beginning of a two-and-a-half month ordeal, trapped 12,000 feet above sea level with no food or water supply.
The soft, deep snow that cushioned the impact of the small Uruguayan passenger plane turned out to be Eduardo’s enemy.
Nothing could grow in such harsh conditions, the water froze, the glare of the sun created “snow blindness” and the temperatures of -30 degrees made a trip to find help almost impossible.
One by one, 33 of the 45 passengers and crew who had not died in the accident began to die.
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After a few days, the survivors were so hungry that they tried to eat shoes and clothes to fill their aching stomachs.
Little by little, they talked about a food source buried in the snow that under normal circumstances no one would dare to taste: the flesh of the dead.
In an exclusive interview, Eduardo, 76, a founding member of the Old Christians rugby club who chartered the ill-fated airliner in 1972, says it wasn’t the taste that put him off.
Eduardo, who lost many close friends in the infamous tragedy, tells The Sun: “My mind was fine, I went through the whole process and I didn’t have any problems with conscience, but my body rejected it the first time.
“It was something unconscious because of the culture and all the taboos.”
The taste was not the problem.
And he continues: “You don’t know, it’s like eating a piece of rice.”
It was Fito, Eduardo’s practical cousin, who was the first person willing to cut up one of the corpses, which had been well preserved thanks to the freezing temperatures.
Fito helped his relative swallow the small bite of meat.
Eduardo says: “It helped me eat it, because the first time it wasn’t easy.”
This was the tenth day on the mountain in October 1972, when the meager rations of chocolate-covered peanuts and crackers were long gone.
He eventually got used to it, but they only ate a small amount to give themselves some protein.
The story of how 16 passengers defied the odds to get off the inhospitable mountain is the subject of a new three-part ITN Channel 5 documentary titled Andes Plane Crash.
Their battle for survival has also been told in the 1993 film Alive, starring Ethan Hawke, and in this year’s Society of the Snow.
Surprisingly, being forced to eat meat was not the biggest test for Eduardo.
The darkest day was when an avalanche devastated the fuselage of the crashed plane in which the survivors of the accident slept every night.
They needed to be huddled indoors to protect themselves from strong winds and -30 degree temperatures.
Eduardo was buried alive by the crushing snow and for the first time he gave in to the idea of death.
He remembers: “He was buried in the snow, I was sure he was dead. I had this experience of dying, it was really very powerful.
“At that moment I didn’t want to leave, I wanted to die, I didn’t want to suffer anymore, but within a few seconds I was fighting to survive and get out.”
His cousin helped get him out, but eight passengers died from suffocation due to the weight of the snow.
Among them was Eduardo’s best friend, Marcelo Pérez, who was the captain of the rugby team and his partner in the firm of a budding architect.
He says: “Marcelo was my closest friend, but he died in the snow next to me.
“It was like an electric shock when I realized that Marcelo was dead, I tried to save him, to remove the snow and ice from his face.”
But Eduardo could not mourn his loss, because falling into depression could be fatal.
He explains: “It was very interesting how the mind works, we couldn’t get sad, we couldn’t cry.
“You couldn’t expand your energy by being sad, because that was very dangerous.”
One of the biggest battles during his 72 days in the desert was staying positive.
We couldn’t be sad, we couldn’t cry.
Eduardo believed he was going to be rescued.
That was difficult because on the 11th they heard on the radio that the search and rescue had been canceled.
No one was expected to have survived the crash and the wreckage was too small for anyone to spot from the air.
He says: “You must have hope all the time, you must think that you will make it.
“It was thinking about loved ones, it was the only way to do it. We had loved ones waiting for us. “Love is what saved us.”
The mind may have told them to live, but the body was telling them other things.
Eduardo says: “It was very difficult to warm up and keep your mind healthy, it was a continuous fight with your mind, but the greatest suffering was the lack of water.
“Thirst was the most terrible physical suffering.”
Although they were surrounded by snow, it was difficult to turn it into water.
The clever Fito, who also created makeshift sunglasses, placed snow on a metal tray in the sun so it would melt and form a bottle underneath.
But at night the water soon froze again.
It was the terrible weather that played a major role in the crash of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571.
The co-pilot appears to have miscalculated his position due to poor visibility.
This meant that the descent to Santiago de Chile began too early and by the time the captain realized they were heading towards the summits, it was too late.
Winter storms made leaving the crash site to seek help a suicide mission.
Passengers had no climbing equipment, no tent, no sleeping bags and no way to stay warm or dry outside the plane.
But they managed to make a waterproof sleeping bag with the insulation and cords from the tail fin.
Nando Parrado and Roberto Canessa volunteered to make the trip on December 12, because it was clear that the sickest survivors would soon die.
Eduardo could not go due to severe altitude sickness.
The sound of the helicopter engines was so magnificent, the music most beautiful.
Eduardo Strauch
Ten days later, the two men managed to find help and helicopters were dispatched.
For Eduardo, the moment he saw the rescue team was the happiest of his life.
He says: “I couldn’t stop smiling, it was the most beautiful moment of my life.
“It was a very deep happiness, we were saved.
“The sound of the helicopter engines was magnificent, the music was most beautiful.”
In 1995 Eduardo returned to the accident site to remember his lost friends and was finally able to shed his tears.
Since then he has returned another 20 times.
He says: “I need to be in the place where I had the most powerful, important, happy, terrible and sad moments of my life.
“I need to remember my friends who couldn’t be saved.
“When I go now I can cry. I like being on that mountain that at first I hated and now I love it.”
The father of five children knows that the experience changed his outlook on life.
Eduardo concludes: “When you are surrounded by death for so long you realize how important it is to be alive.
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“I get more value out of life now than before the trip. I’m not afraid of dying, I’m just worried about not having time to do everything I want. I enjoy every day.”
Plane Crash in the Andes: Terror at 30,000 Feet airs on Channel 5 this week at 10 pm from Tuesday, January 9 to Thursday, January 11 and on My5
