Amazon plane crash: Colombian children survived on cassava and fruits, family say

Children are dehydrated but well, say officials, as head of rescue effort says his teams repeatedly passed within metres of the children but missed them

Cassava flour and some familiarity with the rainforest’s fruits were key to the extraordinary survival for 40 days of four children in the Amazon jungle after the plane they were in crashed, the children’s uncle has said.

“When the plane crashed, they took out [of the wreckage] a fariña, and with that, they survived,” the children’s uncle, Fidencio Valencia told reporters outside the hospital in Bogotá, where they are expected to remain for a minimum of two weeks. Fariña is a cassava flour that people eat in the Amazon region.