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Lost and alone in one of the most remote corners of the vast tropical forests of Brazil, Antonio Sena knew at least what he feared the most: “the great predators of the Amazon: jaguars, crocodiles and anacondas” .
But the 36-year-old pilot wasn’t just worried about being a deadly animal’s next meal. He had to find food, water and shelter.
It was a frightening task, and he feared it would take days to rescue him after his plane crash.
What Antonio didn’t suspect was that he would struggle to survive, hungry and alone, for over a month.
Crash landing
“Mayday, mayday, mayday … Pap, Tango, India, Romeo, Juliet falls …”. So began Antonio’s last radio message.
The plane he flew alone in January, on a trip to refuel at a distant mine, was in serious difficulty.
“The engine suddenly stopped at 900 meters. I had to make a forced landing in the middle of the jungle,” Antonio told the BBC.
Crashing against tree branches, the pilot miraculously managed to lower his Cessna plane into an uninhabited area north of the Amazon River.
Legend,
Antonio’s plane crashed north of the Amazon River in the Brazilian jungle.
Antonio had escaped death, but his troubles were only beginning. Fuel had spilled over the entire fuselage of the aircraft.
“I had to give up the plane because I knew the situation was very dangerous,” he said.
Antonio stayed by the plane in the hope that his last message had been heard and help was on the way.
“I gathered everything that could help me survive a few days in the jungle,” he recalls.
“At the time, I figured I would have to be there for five to eight days, the usual time for a search and rescue operation.
But a week passed and no help came.
Go alone
Antonio decided that if he wanted to see his loved ones again, he should leave the scene of the accident and try to get to safety.
“I realized I should find a way out of this place.”
The pilot took advantage of the first light of dawn to begin his desperate attempt to find the nearest populated area.
“I decided to walk east, towards the sun, and I would walk every morning for about two to four hours.
“After that, I had to plan the night: build my shelter and build a fire.”
The Amazon is a dangerous place for anyone who suddenly finds himself there alone, without any means of transport or communication. But Antonio had learned skills that would give him a chance to survive.
Antonio’s most feared animals were crocodiles.
“I took a jungle survival course through my aviation job.”
“Plus, I was born and lived in the Amazon.”
Antonio had also taken the time to learn from people who live in remote areas of the rainforest, information that could now mean the difference between life and death.
“Whenever I had the chance, I would talk to the people who live there. You can learn a lot from them.”
Find food
To find food, Antonio enlisted the help of local wildlife.
“There was a fruit that I had never seen in my life, but I watched the monkeys eat it,” he says.
“And I thought if the monkeys could eat it, so could I.”
Antonio also found cocoa a few times, but he needed to find something other than fruit.
The answer?
“Ostrich eggs, a very common bird in the middle of the jungle”.
This bird lays a “big blue egg” that Antonio sometimes managed to find.
“Eggs are eggs. It’s protein and I needed it at the time, so I eat them raw.”
Flee from predators
Although Antonio managed to find enough food to stay (barely) alive, he also had to avoid becoming the lunchtime of some of the Amazon’s greatest inhabitants.
“Every time I built my shelter, I made it on top of the hills,” he explained.
The anaconda is one of the Amazon’s top predators.
“And the reason is that jaguars, crocodiles, and anacondas have a great relationship with water, so I’ve never camped next to a water source.”
Antonio also took care to make a lot of noise while walking in the jungle.
He knew that during the day he was more likely to be attacked by an animal that suddenly got scared.
I hope finally
Although Antonio’s survival skills were working, he had lost a lot of weight.
It had been weeks since he left the wreckage of his plane.
But after 36 days, he finally met a small group of people.
“After all this time of walking, climbing and climbing hills and crossing rivers, I found a group of chestnut pickers in an isolated area,” he said.
Unable to see them at first, the pilot spotted them by the noise they made.
“I could hear them working.”
Antonio’s ordeal was drawing to a close.
“The only thing that motivated me and gave me the strength to carry on, even with the pain and hunger, was the desire to see my family again.”
“When I finally left the jungle and my family met me at the airport, it was the best time of my life for me.”
After the crash, planes and helicopters were sent to search for the pilot, but the operation was abandoned weeks earlier.
If Antonio hadn’t made it out of the jungle on his own, the plane crash would have meant he would never have seen his family again.
“I was finally able to give them a hug and tell them how much I love them,” Antonio told the BBC.
“I did all of this just for them, thinking of them every time, every time.”
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