She nearly died - The Story of Lesly Mucutuy

So, these four kids and their mom, they're all passengers on a small airplane, and it's passing over the jungle when suddenly something goes wrong with the engine. The pilot tries to radio out, but it's too late; the plane's engine fails, and it starts to plummet down into the jungle. It falls faster and faster until, kaboom, it crashes into the trees below, nose first.

Now the front of the plane is a complete wreck. The pilot and one other passenger die on impact, but the mom survives, although she's badly injured. The four kids, who were sitting at the rear of the plane, for the most part, are unscathed.

Now, these kids are young; they're 13, 9, 4, and 11 months old. The 13-year-old's name is Leslie, and Leslie has no idea if anyone's looking for them or if anyone even knows their plane has crashed. Oh, but that's not going to stop Leslie.

Her mom is seriously injured, so she has to take charge, and the first thing she and the other kids do is create a makeshift shelter from branches, held together by using her hair ties. They all just chill there by the wreckage, trying to survive. Four days later, unfortunately, Mom passes away due to her injuries, so now it's just the four kids out there all by themselves.

Leslie knows they need to leave soon and get away from the dead bodies because the scent will likely attract dangerous animals. So, the four kids leave; they walk and they walk, hiding when they think danger is near. Leslie finds fruit along the way so they can eat, and they had taken a bag of UKF flour from the plane wreckage that they had been dissolving in water to feed it to the youngest, the 11-month-old.

They're constantly walking and taking turns carrying the baby, and it's the jungle, so of course, it rains, and their clothes are always wet. At night, the temperature drops dramatically, so they're all cold. Meanwhile, back in civilization, people are worried about the passengers on that plane.

Luckily, the pilot's message was heard as the plane was going down before it fell off the radar. They hear this message and start a search effort right away, but because the plane crashed in the thickest part of the jungle, this search for the wreckage is not going to be easy. The Colombian military ends up getting involved, dedicating a ton of resources to this.

They're sending reconnaissance flights and using infrared sensors and satellite imagery to try to find the plane under all the trees. They even send 110 Special Forces on the ground to try to look for this plane, and they still can't find it. Interestingly enough, the jungle is almost too dangerous for these Special Forces.

It's always raining, so their clothes are soaked, and they keep running out of food while dodging wild animals and venomous snakes. Then, local indigenous people get involved and start searching for the kids since they're more familiar with the area and have a more spiritual approach to the search, taking Iasa, hoping it will point them in the right direction. Now, I don't know if that actually helped much, but I'm sure they had a really good time.

At this point, two weeks have gone by, and these kids are still out there. Finally, some indigenous people find the crash site, and when the military investigates, the only thing they find are the bodies of the adults. So they wonder, where the hell are the kids?

Now, while this is going on, the kids themselves make this search really difficult because they're not only out in the middle of nowhere, but they're also intentionally hiding because they're scared. Leslie knows that parts of the jungle are populated with rebel militia groups who aren't very friendly to outsiders. So when they hear anyone coming, they hide.

Plus, these kids aren't your regular iPad kids; they're actually indigenous, with Tuu people, and they learned hunting, fishing, and jungle survival at an early age. They were basically raised in areas of the jungle, so they're very good at hiding and staying on their feet. The military is having a really tough time finding these kids, so they get creative.

They have helicopters go up and drop 10,000 leaflets with survival tips written on them for the kids, telling them to stay put. They also record the kids' grandmother telling them to stay in one place so they can be rescued, and then they blare that message through loudspeakers. But none of that works, and no one can find these kids.

At this point, they've all been out there for over five weeks, and people are starting to wonder if they'll ever find them until, at one point, the kids are all hiding, and they're suddenly approached by an animal—not a wild, dangerous animal. It's actually a Belgian Shepherd, a dog named Wilson, a military rescue dog, and he's apparently very friendly. Upon seeing this dog, the kids know someone's close, and they recognize this as good news because a rebel militia group wouldn't have a dog as good as Wilson.

For the first time, they don't run and hide; instead, they mostly stay put, knowing a rescue team is close. Wilson is with them for about two or three days. Meanwhile, rescuers on the other side of the jungle follow his paw prints until they ultimately reach the kids.

Finally, on their 40th day in the jungle, soldiers find Leslie and her siblings, and they're tired and starving. And at this point, they're basically wearing rags, but they're safe. However, there is some bad news.

Unfortunately, before the kids were rescued, they got separated from Wilson, and the poor dog—he got lost in the jungle, and he was never found again. Rest in peace, Wilson.