Survival kits and thousands of leaflets were dropped in the Colombian jungle over the weekend in an attempt to find the four children who disappeared after the small plane they were traveling in crashed in early May, Colombian authorities said.
The presidency announced in a statement on Monday the dropping from helicopters of 10,000 leaflets, in Spanish and in the indigenous language, indicating how to contact the emergency services. The army said on Saturday it had airdropped around 100 survival kits containing food and water.
More than 160 soldiers are engaged in the search to try to find the four children aged thirteen, nine, four and an eleven-month-old baby who have been missing for 22 days in the jungle.
The Cessna 206 in which they were traveling disappeared from radar on May 1 in the vicinity of San José del Guaviare, in the department of Caquetà (south). He was found on May 15 with his nose crushed to the ground in the middle of dense vegetation.
Three bodies were recovered by the emergency services, those of the children's mother, the pilot and a leader of the Uitoto indigenous community, to which the passengers belonged. They were the only adults on board the small plane.
A group of aborigines from seven indigenous peoples from all over the country, accustomed to the jungle, have been participating in the search since the weekend, the presidency said.
Indigenous communities "carry out spiritual processes of talking to the jungle and asking it to talk" and helping them locate the children, she further said.
Authorities are also trying to trace the children using satellite technology to determine what path they might have taken through the jungle.
Military forces believe they could roam an area of about 323 square kilometers, or 80% of the area of Bogota, a city of eight million people.
During the search on land, they found a footprint, belongings including a bottle, as well as a makeshift shelter and nibbled fruit.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro announced last Wednesday on Twitter the rescue of the four children before retracting the next day, indicating that the search was continuing.
05/22/2023 21:22:54 - Bogotá (AFP) - © 2023 AFP
