Confusion in Columbia as 4 children reported found alive 17 days after plane crash

Nepal Views

Kathmandu: There is confusion over whether four children have been found alive in Amazon rainforest, more than two weeks after a plane crash in Colombia.

President Gustavo Petro claimed on Wednesday they had been located alive after an ‘arduous search’. Announcing the missing children had been found, Petro wrote on Twitter, ‘After arduous searching by our military, we have found alive the four children who went missing after a plane crash in Guaviare. A joy for the country.’

But defence ministry sources have told local media they have no confirmation they have been found alive. More than 100 soldiers have been searching with sniffer dogs since the plane vanished on 1 May. The crashed in the Amazon 17 days ago killed three adults, including the pilot.

Colombian authorities believe the four missing children were wandering through the rainforest since the plane went down in the southern region. They are thought to be aged between 11 months and 13 years.

The Cessna 206 light aircraft was flying between Araracuara in Amazonas province and San Jose del Guaviare, a city in Guaviare province, when it disappeared in the early hours.

Earlier in the week, soldiers found the wreckage of the aircraft, nose buried in the jungle floor, and the bodies of the three dead.

Earlier on Wednesday, the Colombian armed forces said that search efforts intensified after rescuers came across a ‘shelter built in an improvised way with sticks and branches,’ leading them to believe there were survivors. However, there were no reports from the Colombian military confirming the discovery of the children.

Rescuers believe the four children – aged 13, nine, four and an 11-month-old baby – wandered through the jungle in the southern Caqueta Department since the crash on May 1.

On Monday and Tuesday, soldiers found the bodies of the pilot and two adults who had been flying from a jungle location to San Jose del Guaviare, one of the main cities in Colombia’s Amazon rainforest. The region has few roads and is also difficult to access by river, so transport by small aeroplane is common.

One of the dead passengers, Ranoque Mucutuy, was the mother of the four children, who are of the Huitoto ethnicity.