Nando Parrado
Fernando "Nando" Seler Parrado Dolgay is a Uruguayan businessman, producer, motivational speaker, author, television presenter, former rugby player and a racing driver. He is one of the sixteen survivors of the Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, which crashed in the Andes on 13 October 1972. After spending two months trapped in the mountains with the other crash survivors, he, along with Roberto Canessa, climbed through the Andes mountains over a 10-day period to find help.
Background
Early life
Parrado was born in Montevideo on December 9, 1949, the second of three children of Seler Parrado and Xenia "Eugenia" Dolgay, a Ukrainian immigrant who arrived in Uruguay at the age of 16. Raised in the Carrasco neighborhood, he attended Stella Maris College, and played for its alumni rugby team, Old Christians Club.At the time of the Andes crash, he was a university student. Of his life prior to the accident Parrado states that:
After the Andes
Parrado co-wrote the 2006 book Miracle in the Andes: 72 Days on the Mountain and My Long Trek Home, with Vince Rause. The book references Piers Paul Read's 1974 account of the accident and aftermath, Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors, a book based on interviews with the survivors. Miracle in the Andes, however, is told only from Parrado's point of view 34 years later. In Chapter 10 of Miracle in the Andes, Parrado notes that after he returned from the mountains, he struggled to cope with the loss of his mother and younger sister Susy in the Andes. He gave up his formal studies, drifted for a period of time, and helped out with his father's business.As he was interested in the field of sports car racing, Parrado enrolled in the Jim Russell Racing Driver School. For many years, he developed a career as a professional race car driver, which he gave up after his marriage to Veronique Van Wassenhove. He then took over his father's hardware business alongside his older sister Graciela and her husband, and developed additional businesses. In addition to his work in business and television, Parrado is a motivational speaker, using his experience in the Andes to help others cope with psychological trauma.
In 2020, a racehorse named after Parrado won the Coventry Stakes at the Royal Ascot meeting. Parrado gave his consent for the horse to be named after him.
Filmography
Parrado was portrayed by Ethan Hawke in the 1993 feature film Alive and by Argentine actor Agustín Pardella in the 2023 Spanish feature film Society of the Snow.| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
| 1993 | Alive | technical advisor | feature film |
| 1993 | Alive: 20 Years Later | himself | video documentary |
| 2002 | Return to the Andes | himself | video documentary short |
| 2006 | Alive: Back to the Andes | himself | TV documentary |
| 2007 | Stranded: I've Come from a Plane That Crashed on the Mountains | himself | documentary |
| 2009 | Independent Lens' | himself | TV series documentary |
| 2010 | I Am Alive: Surviving the Andes Plane Crash | himself | documentary aired on History Channel |
| 2023 | Society of the Snow | Airport family member | feature film |
| 2024 | Society of the Snow: Who Were We on the Mountain? | himself | Netflix documentary |