When the code word ‘miracle’ is heard four times, cheers rise in the Colombian jungle | Abroad

“Miracle, miracle, miracle, miracle!” As these redeeming words sound through the Colombian army radio, a deafening cheer goes up in the jungle. It is the agreed code word – one for each child – if the military found the four missing children. The message that the whole of Colombia has been waiting and hoping for for 40 days now causes a national outburst of joy.

The fate of Lesly Mucutuy (13), her brothers Soleiny (9) and Tien Noriel (4) and sister Cristin (1 year) has been uncertain since May 1. That day, they boarded a Cessna 206 in the Amazon village of Araracuara, along with an indigenous leader and the pilot.

They never reached their destination, San José del Guaviare. The pilot reported engine problems. Contact was lost and the aircraft disappeared from radar. It took rescuers two weeks to reach the plane wreckage. They found the bodies of the three dead adults. There was no trace of the children. They had left the wreckage with their deceased mother behind and have been wandering around in the Amazon rainforest ever since.

The military launched a major search operation known as Operation Hope (Esperanza). Some 120 commandos and 73 members of indigenous groups searched for the children under difficult conditions in the impenetrable jungle. With sniffer dogs they combed an area with a circumference of 4 to 5 kilometers between Guaviare and Caquetá. Visibility was made difficult by bad weather, fog and the dense forest.

Manuel Ranoque also searched for his two sons and stepdaughters. He hadn’t seen them since early April. He fled the house in a hurry because of threats from the Farc guerrilla movement. His wife and children were on their way to him by plane. They would be reunited in Villavicencio after a stopover.

Ranoque wanted to join the search himself, because he knows the area well. Aircraft fired flares to give the search teams on the ground a better view. The army dropped food packages and leaflets with instructions from helicopters. “We also spread hope,” said army commander Pedro Sanchez. “We did everything it took to make the impossible possible.”

All doomsday scenarios passed in review. Also the possibility that the children would be held by rebels. But the nearest camp found had long since been abandoned.

There was confusion when President Gustavo Petro tweeted on May 17 that the children had been found alive. That turned out not to be true. Still, hope was never given up. Traces indicated that the children were still alive: clothing, shoes, scissors, baby bottle, diaper and a shelter made of branches.

The family also firmly believed that the children could survive in the jungle. Lesly, Soleiny, Tien and Cristin belong to the Witoto (Huiototo), an indigenous people in southeastern Colombia. They know that Lesly will take care of her younger brothers and sister. “She knows what it’s like to live in the forest and can build huts,” said their aunt. “She also knows which fruits they can eat. I feel they are alive, she is strong and wild. She keeps the rest alive.”

The fact that the children kept walking around made the search more difficult. That is why their grandmother Fátima Valencia recorded a message in the native language. Her voice coming from the speakers broke the silence of the jungle. She urged her grandchildren not to wander, but to stay in one place so they could be found.

On Friday afternoon five o’clock (local time) grandma Fátima received a call from the police. The inspector has just heard from the jungle soldiers that her grandchildren have been found. She is too emotional to express in words.

The children, baby Cristin has now turned 1, were found about 5 kilometers from the place where her plane crashed. They are weakened, malnourished, dehydrated and covered in insect bites, but they are alive. They were transferred by helicopter to San José del Guaviare, where they received first aid from doctors. They were then flown to Bogotá in an army plane under medical supervision, together with their father and grandfather. They are now staying in a military hospital.

President Porte says the successful rescue is the result of a unique collaboration between the army and the indigenous people. And above all of the courage of the four children. “They were alone, they made it on their own,” said Porte. “It is an example of extreme survival that will go down in history. They are children of the jungle, now they are children of Colombia.”

Check out our most viewed news videos in the playlist below: