Eduardo Strauch, Roberto Canessa and Gustavo Zerbino all survived the horrific crash (Picture: Shutterstock)
When a plane full of amateur rugby players crashed in the Andes in 1972, 16 survivors ate the flesh of their dead friends to stay alive – and now one has revealed he is proud of his decision.
Since the crash, survivor Roberto Canessa, 70, revealed that while the choice ‘wasn’t easy’, he would have wanted his friends to do the same if he had died in the crash.
On October 13, 1972, 45 people boarded the Uruguayan Flight 571 bound for Santiago, Chile.
The pilot veered off course in dense fog, crashing the chartered flight into the snow-capped peaks – and the survivors spent 72 days surviving in the perilous conditions.
Canessa told The Mail Online: ‘I chose to live. I am proud of what I did.’
He explained in his book I Had To Survive that while the group knew what they needed to do, ‘it was too horrible to contemplate.’
The tale has been documented in a new Netflix show, Society of the Snow (Picture: Netflix)
The men survived, but lost half of their body weight (Picture: AP)
The crash killed most of the passengers instantly, but 16 survived (Picture: Rex)
He added: ‘For a long time, we agonized. I went out in the snow and prayed to God for guidance. Without His consent, I felt I would be violating the memory of my friends; that I would be stealing their souls.’
Canessa, who was a medical student at the time, was the one to suggest the remaining survivors eat the flesh of the dead corpses.
‘Of course, the idea of eating human flesh was terrible, repugnant,’ fellow survivor Ramon Sabella told the Times last year. ‘It was hard to put in your mouth. But we got used to it.’
Mr Canessa described using glass to cut the flesh and took solace in knowing his dead teammates would have done the exact same if it was him who had perished.
The team made a pact that anyone else who died could be eaten by the survivors.
The survivors were rescued after 72 days (Picture: Rex)
The group were rescued thanks to a Chilean shepherd they found (Picture: Rex)
They miraculously came across a Chilean shepherd called Sergio Catalán, but he could not hear them over the water.
The shepherd returned the next day, tossing a rock with a pen and pencil for the survivors, who explained the situation to him.
A helicopter was sent to rescue the remaining survivors, who had lost over half of their body weight.
Another survivor, Eduardo Strauch, 76, told the Sun about the moment the group knew they were saved: ‘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 so magnificent, the most beautiful music.’
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