Four young children have been found alive after more than a month wandering the Amazon where they survived like «children of the jungle.»
Four young children have been found alive after more than a month wandering the Amazon where they survived like «children of the jungle,» according to Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro.
«Their learning from indigenous families and their learning of living in the jungle has saved them,» Petro told reporters on Friday, after announcing on Twitter that they had been found 40 days after they went missing following a plane crash that killed their mother.
Petro said the children were all together when they were found, adding they had demonstrated an example of «total survival that will be remembered in history.»
«They are children of the jungle and now they are children of Colombia,» he added.
Revealing their discovery earlier in the day, the Colombian president had tweeted an image that seems to show search crews treating the children in a forest clearing, along with the words: «A joy for the whole country!»
Their grandmother, María Fátima Valencia, said she was «going to hug all of them» and «thank everyone» as soon as they were reunited in their home city of Villavicencio, where they live.
«I’m going to encourage them, I’m going to push them forward, I need them here,» she said.
The children, who appear gaunt in the photos, were evaluated by doctors before being flown out by the Colombian Air Force on an air ambulance to the Military Transport Air Command in Bogota, the capital, early Saturday morning.
Four medics, including a pediatrician and a neonatologist, provided treatment on board the plane, according to the air force.
The air ambulance landed at the Military Transport Air Command in Bogota Saturday morning, data from Fightradar24 showed.
