13-Year-Old Carried Her Baby Sister Through the Amazon

Lesly Mucutuy was 13 when she and her three younger siblings were found alive after 40 days in the Colombian Amazon. (Digital Illustration: GoBeyondLocal)

13-Year-Old Carried Her Baby Sister Through the Amazon

Lesly Mucutuy was 13 when the small plane carrying her family disappeared into the Colombian Amazon.

The aircraft had left Araracuara for San José del Guaviare with four children and three adults aboard. About 35 minutes into the flight, pilot Hernán Murcia reported that the engine was failing. He began looking for somewhere to land.

The Cessna 206 failed to reach a safe landing place.

When the aircraft struck the rainforest canopy on 1 May 2023, Lesly hit her head and briefly lost consciousness. When she came around, she heard her baby sister crying.

Her mother, Magdalena Mucutuy Valencia, was still holding the baby, 11-month-old Cristin. Lesly called for her mother, but Magdalena did not answer.

Lesly unfastened her seatbelt and pulled Cristin from the arms of Magdalena. A cut on the head of Lesly was bleeding, so she used one of the nappies used for Cristin to press against it.

Two other children had survived the impact: nine-year-old Soleiny and five-year-old Tien. The three adults in the aircraft, including Magdalena, were dead.

Lesly got her younger siblings out of the wreckage and moved them a short distance away.

She made a basic shelter by stringing up a towel and mosquito net. The rain in the forest was heavy, and the net gave the children some protection from insects. They stayed there while waiting for someone to find them.

Tien kept asking when their mother would wake up. Lesly knew what had happened, but she was unsure if her younger brother understood that their mother was dead. She told him she did not know.

Lesly eventually decided that staying beside the aircraft was too dangerous. She also knew the children would require water.

Before leaving, she searched the wreckage for things that might help them. She took cassava flour known as fariña, along with a pair of scissors, the mosquito net and a bottle used for the baby. Other accounts of the time in the forest also describe clothes, nappies, a first-aid kit and some drinks and sweets being taken from the wreckage.

Then Lesly led Soleiny, Tien and Cristin away from the aircraft.

She had grown up in the Huitoto Indigenous community and had learned about life in the rainforest from an early age. She knew how to walk through the forest, which fruits could be eaten and which should be avoided. Her family also said she had looked after her younger siblings while growing up.

Her knowledge of the forest did not make the conditions easier.

The children were in a remote part of the Amazon during the rainy season. They had to deal with constant wetness, insects, thick vegetation and the difficulty of finding a safe place to sleep. Lesly and Soleiny took turns carrying Cristin.

They collected rainwater in a bottle used for the baby and ate food they could find in the forest. Among the fruits they ate was juan soco, while milpeso palm seeds also became food. Lesly chewed the hard seeds and fed the softer pulp to the younger children.

She also mixed water with some of the fariña for Cristin.

The children did not stay in one place. They moved from one spot to another and sometimes hid inside tree trunks to escape the rain.

At one point, a poisonous snake came close to Lesly. She killed it with a stick.

The dense forest offered no easy route out. Lesly searched for signs of people and places where they might find help, but the children did not come across a road, settlement or other obvious route to safety.

Back at the crash site, rescuers had begun searching for them.

The aircraft was located about two weeks after the crash. The bodies of the three adults were still inside, but the four children were gone.

Then the searchers began finding small signs that someone had passed through the forest.

There were footprints. There were discarded nappies. There were pieces of fruit showing signs of having been eaten by children. A pair of scissors was also found.

The footprints, nappies, fruit and scissors showed that the children had survived the crash and moved into the forest.

The search became known as Operation Hope.

Colombian soldiers entered the rainforest with Indigenous volunteers who knew the terrain. Helicopters flew above the trees. Search dogs were taken into the forest. The search eventually involved about 150 soldiers and 200 Indigenous volunteers, covering more than 323 square kilometres.

The rescuers also tried to let the children know that people were looking for them.

From helicopters, loudspeakers played a recording of the grandmother of the children speaking in their Indigenous language. She told them that searchers were looking for them and urged them to stay in one place.

Lesly heard the aircraft and the voice coming from above. She did not understand at first that the voice was coming from the search operation.

On one occasion, searchers came close to the children. General Pedro Sánchez later said the rescuers passed within about 40 metres of them. Lesly heard them but did not reveal where the children were.

The thick rainforest allowed the children to stay nearby while making them difficult to locate.

The search continued for weeks.

Heavy rain made footprints difficult to follow. Thick vegetation made it easy for people searching on foot to lose sight of one another. Soldiers and Indigenous guides had to move carefully through the forest while trying to work out where four children could have gone.

Aircraft dropped food in some areas in the hope that the children would find it. Searchers continued looking for signs of their passage.

Then came another setback. A military dog named Wilson became separated from the search party. There were reports that the dog had found signs connected with the children, but Wilson himself disappeared during the operation and was never found.

The search continued despite the setback.

By early June, the children had spent more than a month in the forest.

On 9 June, Indigenous searchers and soldiers came across them in a remote part of the rainforest.

The first sound that drew attention from the rescuers was a cry from the baby.

They found Lesly, Soleiny, Tien and Cristin alive.

Forty days had passed since the plane crash.

The children were weak, malnourished and covered with insect bites, but none was in a critical condition when they were found. Cristin, who had been 11 months old when the plane crashed, had survived long enough in the forest to reach her first birthday there.

The children were taken out through the dense vegetation. The forest was too thick for a helicopter to land beside them, so rescuers had to winch them upwards.

They were first flown to San José del Guaviare. From there, they were taken by military aircraft to Bogotá, where ambulances took them to hospital for medical treatment.