By Gina Vivinetto — NBC News
The deadly 1972 plane crash in the Andes is the inspiration behind a new drama film released on Netflix earlier this month: The Snow Society.
Disaster struck on October 13, 1972, when Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, carrying a Uruguayan rugby team from Montevideo, Uruguay's capital, to Santiago, Chile's, crashed into the Andes Mountains.
The plane was practically reduced to shreds, losing both wings and the tail. Twenty-nine of the 45 passengers died, but not immediately: initially 33 survived. But of those, only 16 endured the region's frigid temperatures, injuries and an avalanche that followed.
[The story of the 1972 plane crash in the Andes has been told a lot, but 'The Snow Society' offers something else]
The survivors were eventually forced to eat the flesh of the dead to stay alive for 72 agonizing days, before finally being rescued.
Forced into cannibalism to survive
Each of the 16 survivors contributed first-person accounts to Pablo Vierci's book The Snow Society, which inspired the Netflix film.
One of the passengers, Dr. Roberto Canessa, also shared his memories of the accident with NBC News reporter Tom Llamas in November 2023.
"I thought I was going to die," recalled Canessa, who was just 19 at the time of the accident.
Canessa said watching Snow Society was difficult because, unlike previous versions of the story, Netflix got the grimmest details of the event right, even traveling to the actual crash site to film.
The film's actors and crew members set up camp in the mountains, enduring the same freezing temperatures as Canessa and her companions after the accident.
"I immersed myself in that place again. I went back to the fuselage," Canessa said of watching the film.
[Surviving 72 Days in the Snow Was 'Harder' Than Resorting to Cannibalism: The Film About 'The Miracle of the Andes']
During the interview, Canessa recalled the moment he and the others realized that their survival depended on eating their dead teammates and others who had passed away.
"I thought if I died, I'd be proud that my body was used by someone else," he said he thought at the time.
Canessa and teammate Nando Parrado eventually scrambled out of the mountain range to seek help. The survivors were finally rescued on December 22, 1972.
After the accident, Canessa, then a medical student, became a renowned pediatric cardiologist.
Canessa acknowledged that while what happened to the passengers and crew members of Flight 571 was a tragedy, it also taught her "how to avoid difficulties in life and have faith in yourself."
What happened to the 16 survivors?
Of the 16 survivors, 14 are still alive. José Luis Coche Inciarte died in 2023 of cancer, as did Javier Methol, in 2015.
Sergio Catalán, the pastor who met Fernando Parrado and Roberto Canessa after their 10-day journey through the Andes from the crash site, died in 2020 at the age of 91.
While some had private lives, many of the survivors wrote about their experiences and became motivational speakers.
['The Snow Society': The Challenges of Bringing a True Story Beyond Fiction to the Screen]
Canessa, who was 19 at the time of the accident and is now 70, wrote the book I Had to Survive. Parrado became a motivational speaker and wrote the book Miracle of the Andes. Carlitos Páez wrote After the Tenth Day. Inciarte wrote Memorias de los Andes.
Vierci's book offers updates on all the survivors, including Eduardo Stauch, who became an architect and owner of "one of Uruguay's most famous architecture firms," according to the book The Snow Society, and Pancho Delgado, who opened a law firm.
Gustavo Zerbino became director and CEO of the Uruguayan Rugby Federation, according to the book, and worked in the pharmaceutical sector. Tintin Vizintín also remained involved in rugby and became president of the Uruguayan Rugby Union, according to Vierci's book.
They meet every year
According to The Snow Society, the book on which the film was based, survivors gather each year on December 22, the day of the rescue, to "celebrate a ritual commemoration."
Daniel Fernandez, one of the sixteen Uruguayan survivors of the plane crash of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571.EITAN ABRAMOVICH / AFP via Getty Images
"All of them are reunited with their families. In this way they have seen all their friends' children as they were born, together with their own. Now most of her children are between 18 and 26 years old, exactly the age they were on the mountain. They remind them of themselves," the book reads.
Canessa, according to the text, built a hall in her home in the hope that it could be a "meeting place for the group."
Many of them gathered to watch an advance screening hosted by Netflix of The Snow Society, according to Llamas. When the film ended, the men burst into thunderous applause. Then they hugged each other and cried.