Miracle in the Andes: 72 Days on the Mountain and My Long Trek Home
In 1972, a charter flight carrying 45 people, including a Uruguayan rugby team, crashed on a glacier in the Argentinian Andes. In Miracle in the Andes, Nando Parrado recounts his experience as a survivor: the grief of losing his mother in the crash and his sister soon after, the slow fading of hope for a rescue, and his resolve to attempt a dangerous trek out of the mountains in search of civilization.
Written 30 years after the crash, Parrado's memoir still carries all the urgency, suspense, and harrowing detail as if he were telling it in real time.
Quote:
"For a brief, magical moment, all my fears lifted, and I knew that I would not let death control me. I would walk through the godforsaken country that separated me from my home with love and hope in my heart. I would walk until I had walked all the life out of me, and when I fell I would die that much closer to my father.”
Author:
Nando Parrado is a Uruguayan author, public speaker, and television producer. In 2010, the World Business Forum selected him as the "Best Public Speaker in the World."
Published: 2006
Length: 304 pages
Set in: Argentina and Uruguay