Episode 02 of 10.
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Pico dos Marins | Episode 2: The Secret of the Mountain | Original Globoplay Podcast
Globoplay December 20, 2022.
#Globoplay #Podcast #PicoDosMarins
What do the over 2,400 meters of altitude of Pico dos Marins hide? In 1985, the mountain is scoured by at least 200 people, including military personnel, firefighters, local guides, climbers, speleologists, and even psychics. The press closely follows everything. It was Operation Marins, one of the largest searches for a civilian in Brazil's history.
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[ If you haven't listened to the first episode of this podcast yet, my first recommendation is to stop now and go listen to Episode 1, which is called "A Grave Without an Answer." How many times have you climbed this year alone? I've been there seven times. So, group, are we going? We'll arrive at night. After spending a week interviewing some people you've already heard or will hear here, the last mission of our team in Piquete was missing: climbing Pico dos Marins. It was 5 AM, and we still had to take a car to the base of the mountain to climb the peak and return before 3 PM. It was hot those days, but a cold front was predicted to arrive in the afternoon. The group held me back. You guys will get there quickly, right at the beginning? No, not at the very beginning, but it's down there. Seu Ivo was traveling with us, coordinating all the interviews. When he found out about the plan, he was worried, and rightly so. It was on that mountain that his son, Marco Aurélio, disappeared in 1985. So, he preferred to take advantage of his day off to visit the Basilica of Nossa Senhora Aparecida nearby and give an interview to a local journalist. At 83 years old, Seu Ivo doesn't stop. He wasn't going to climb Marins, but he would do his part to keep Marco Aurélio's story alive forever. But why climb Pico dos Marins? I thought that time you guys came here, you opened that little house to see if there were any traces of him, I thought you had disappeared. You didn't climb, so I never climbed. I've been there about four or five times. I had already been to the base of Pico dos Marins a few times and always looked at the beginning of the trail, wondering, "Is this where they went? How difficult is the path? Where was Marco last seen? Did he fall into a crevice? What difficulties did the military, firefighters, and volunteers face?" The truth is, I have a much longer list of questions than that, and I hoped to answer at least some of them by retracing the route that Chief Ruan had taken in '85 with scouts Ricardo Ramatis, Osvaldo, and Marco Aurélio. And so we went. Our team consisted of Flávio Guedes on direct sound, Rafael Bottino, the producer we call Mosca, Lucas Peixoto, our experienced local guide, and myself, Marcelo Mesquita. If you've forgotten my name, it's Marcelo Mesquita. Right from the start, it was clear it wasn't going to be easy, especially climbing with all the filming and sound equipment. After an hour, when we reached Morro do Careca, a rock slab with a view of the valley, which is the first and classic stopping point of the climb, our breathing was already heavy. "Beautiful horizon, what's that? Lorena Guará, Aparecida is well to this side, which means the weather is going to change a bit." Further on, we felt the fatigue even more, but the excitement of advancing on the mountain and its more than 2,400 meters was also evident on everyone's face and lungs. "I almost rolled down there, I'm tired. Now your backpack is open. Thank you." It wasn't cool, this chat reflects our group well on the mountain. The guide Lucas, trying to find the best echo and present the best of Marins. Flávio, the sound technician, this guy is always helpful but also worried. And I'm anxious to film whatever comes our way. [Music] My sneaker slipped, the sole is worn. He did this on the sand, and then, BAM, with the camera. Luckily, the lens didn't hit. And I didn't have my hands free because of the camera. And this guy said, "Good thing you didn't break yourself." It's Mosca, our producer. [Music] [Music] Sometimes when people get lost, it's still difficult to find them. You saw that? This is the level of this, listen to it, but you don't find his direction. While fighting on the rocks, little by little, we understood that Pico dos Marins can be treacherous, whether climbing up, down, or asking for help. We had to know how to read, listen to the mountain to proceed safely. Guide Lucas knew this well and was worried the whole time about us reaching the summit and returning at the agreed time before the cold front arrived. "I have to start, don't change the clouds. Now it starts to blow. Flávio, put on your pants, put on your jacket, put everything back on, and pay attention." Our slow pace also started to be a concern. "It's starting to get cold, isn't it?" "No, no, I don't want to rush, because sometimes stopping causes a disadvantage, cooling the body, losing rhythm, then you get tired. It's better to go slow and continue, I think, than to force, force, and stop." "I know, I also think this theory: stopping makes the body cold." Remembering that on the day Marco Aurélio was reported missing, the weather had also turned, with fog covering Marins. But we continued anyway. And finally, we found the exact spot where Osvaldo got hurt. Imagine a place with many rocks, holes, low vegetation, and a lot of dry grass. We stopped there, imagining the possible accident sites, which were not few. The pain, the reaction of probable collective panic or not, upon learning that they would have to descend with Osvaldo on their backs, and finally, Marco Aurélio's gesture of offering to go down first. And something important caught our attention: we realized that they were not as close to the summit as described in the scouts' report. We decided to pick up the pace. We had already walked for two hours, and it was better not to even count how much time was left. Suddenly, an unexpected conversation occurred. "I'm tired, and there's some pressure. What about you? Have you ever done any type of trail like this?" "No, I haven't climbed this much before. I've done the Amazon, dense jungle." Flávio, the sound technician, opened up to Mosca, who wasn't comfortable with the pressure of the climb. And half an hour later, he positioned himself more strongly. "Who's feeling their calves now?" "I'm feeling it." "So, you guys have seen that Han Solo doc? This stick is reaching my limit." "What do you mean?" I even thought he was joking. There was a certain silence, and the crew looked at each other, "Man, he wasn't joking. You guys can go." [Music] That information took Mosca and everyone by surprise. The summit was indeed far away, and Flávio completely lost motivation to continue. And that's when Mosca himself, our producer, spoke up: "Because I don't think it's cool either, man. I don't think it's cool either, but then I started to feel very cold. Today it's not together, you know? That's the problem. It's very calm for now. When you stop here and start to feel a little breeze, you'll feel quite cold." My frustration was obvious, and in the heat of the moment, it challenged me to make the most prudent decision, which was to give up climbing. "Do you want to stay here? It's a bad place to wait." "That's what I always say to my client: if you know you won't be able to come back, just be calm. Everyone knows their limits, right?" "I think she didn't know that you know it's not a joke. You can't risk your health and life. If someone gets sick, then Lucas was right. Climbing or not at that moment wouldn't make any difference. And time was running out, we had to decide. What time is it? But, like, we're four people. One is already starting to show that it will be difficult to reach the end. There are two and a half hours to go up and two and a half hours to come back. To get there, two and a half hours plus what we've already come, it will be 6 PM. Risking arriving in the rain. So, what's dangerous? The rocks are exact. And then, like, ah, stay here. You've already made the same mistake. Make a mistake in what we're doing." The situation was so strange that it seemed like a joke or something forced, but it wasn't. It was just different from 1985, when Ruan found himself at an impasse and had to make all the decisions alone. At that moment, we were deciding everything as a group. There was no hierarchy, and by talking, it became clear to everyone that we had to descend together. "Okay, so let's go back. Descend there, down where Osvaldo was. Have lunch, do something, relax, take a look, feel it a bit. Including, that's it, I think we managed to show that the nose isn't easy at all, man. But imagine these two and a half hours of descent, how tired you won't be. And walking here, we're already feeling it a bit. Up there, you arrive exhausted, exhausted. Look, I can tell you, you've practically reached the halfway point. Halfway? Are you all crazy? On the way back, I was organizing some thoughts about what had happened. First, the hike is tough. Second, I finally understood how Ruan could have taken 12 hours to return to base after Marco Aurélio separated. Pico dos Marins is gigantic. There are many more possibilities of getting lost there than we imagined. And finally, I kept thinking, it's difficult to mention how a search can sweep that gigantic space in that immensity. 200 men became ants. [Music] But the fact is that hundreds of people scoured Pico dos Marins that winter in 1985: military, firefighters, police officers, climbers, and volunteers. The operation dominated the news in São Paulo and Brazil. It was a general commotion, the search for Marco Aurélio, the 15-year-old boy who disappeared on a mountain in the Serra da Mantiqueira. Where was he? This is Pico dos Marins, the case of scout Marco Aurélio, Episode 2, The Secret of the Mountain. Monday, June 10, 1985. Then Lieutenant of Military Police, Ayrton Ribeiro da Costa, arrives for work in Lorena and is informed of an occurrence. "We were called to the command room. There's a missing boy on Pico dos Marins." The situation was official and increasingly urgent. Researching some cases similar to Marco Aurélio's, I came across an American podcast called "In the Dark," which in its first season tells the story of a boy's disappearance in the United States in the late 80s. An idea and a statistic presented there caught my attention. The idea is that as soon as someone disappears, a circle is drawn around the last place the person was seen, and as time passes, this circle of where the person might be grows faster and faster. The statistic is as follows: if a missing child is not found in the first 5 hours, 85% of cases result in death. That is, the more time passes, the larger the circle and the greater the chance of the search not having a happy ending. We don't have this data for Brazil, but looking back now, it's easy to notice the circle around Marco Aurélio expanding as quickly as the fog over Pico dos Marins. "Immediately, I think it would have been much easier, it would have been much easier on Saturday, and the police only got news on Monday." "Almost 48 hours. A person can do a lot. A child can do a lot." In reality, the police were notified on Sunday night, not Monday. Still, it was about 30 hours later. "Walking, he got lost for a few days and was rescued by a truck driver and taken to his destination. It would have been much easier to recover him at the time." Now retired, Ayrton received me and Seu Ivo for an interview at his home in Piquete. "Although it's a very, very difficult moment, we did our best, we did the possible and the impossible, but unfortunately, the gentleman... that little boy... I was only 37 years old, I'm 69 today. I was 32 years old at the time." Lieutenant Ayrton was assigned to support the search. He never climbed the mountain because his duty at the time was exclusively to count the personnel arriving, distribute patrols. "You go north, you go south," and upon their return around 4 PM, he had to recount the personnel, board them, and send them back to their units. On Monday, the official search for Marco Aurélio begins. The commander of the operation was Major Edmundo S. Bosque. Remember this name. Among the military police, there were many volunteers, over 50. One of them is this man here, who is not only with a broken arm but has three broken ribs and a collarbone. "Finding this boy for you is very important." "It's extremely important. The need to find this boy. The people of the city, the local guides in general, everyone wants to find this boy." This report from Jornal Nacional at the time interviews a very significant volunteer in the search, Leilão. "Leilão, and you went with Leilão's gasoline to look for Marco Aurélio?" He was 36 years old and a Federal Highway Police officer but was on leave due to an accident he had suffered. Nevertheless, with a broken arm, he volunteered for Operation Marins. [Music] On one of these trips to Pico dos Marins, we talked to Leilão. This is his voice today. "Honestly, I went there thinking about my son. I forgot I was a drug addict. I went thinking about my son. I said, 'I'm going to adopt this boy.' I went there, I dropped everything, man. For almost a month, I abandoned my gas station, abandoned everything. I left a lot of signed checks for the boy. I said, 'That's it, when you see you're running out of gasoline...' I spent the whole time there, thinking only of one thing: [Music] getting the boy out of there. I asked the fire department. I had some friends who were good in the woods in the fire department, whom I had known all my life and walked with when we were younger. They went there, and soon the army arrived, everyone arrived. Only the navy was missing." We cannot precisely define how many people actually participated in the search for Operation Marins, as there were many volunteers acting informally. However, press reports and testimonies indicate that at least 200 people were involved. Since we don't have official documentation of the search, what came out in the press at the time is fundamental for reconstructing the operation. "And every day I stayed there, I even slept in the radio car, at the time, Brasília." This is journalist Paulo Antônio de Carvalho. He was the editor of the program "Jornal Verdade" on Rádio Mantiqueira. Paulo Antônio remembers the time of the phone call he received from the police that Monday. "9 AM, with two or three other police officers, a firefighter... then I interviewed him, he told me more or less what had happened. The next day, the radio's management thought it interesting for me to go back there, and it started to generate huge audience for the radio." Every day, many people I interviewed about the search also mention Seu Afonso, always as someone helpful and receptive. His name is the family home, that little mud house in front of which Marco Aurélio and the other scouts camped before climbing the peak. They are central in these first days. Then Lieutenant Ayrton remembers well: "We gathered at the base, at Seu Afonso's house, the reference point. Afonso and I talked to distribute the teams." Among the people who experienced the activity at Seu Afonso's house was Dora. Years before, she and her husband had bought the land where the old guide of Pico dos Marins lived, but they let him continue living there in the little house with his family for as long as he wished. On that tragic Corpus Christi holiday in June 1985, Dora was there. "I arrived on Sunday, inclusive. Seu Afonso told me, he told me when I arrived, he said, 'Dora, there's a guy here who's missing.' I even said, 'Oh, it's nothing, God willing, he'll show up.' Because we had never had a case like this." In parallel to the official search of Operation Marins, another complex operation was underway. I'll call it Operation Simon, commanded by the parents. Marco Aurélio's parents, Seu Ivo and Nelma, launch themselves into a desperate but very well-articulated search. On Monday, June 10, 1985, the police begin to scour the mountain. At the same time, Marco Aurélio's parents get in a car heading to Piquete. What goes through their minds as they drive on the Dutra highway and see the Serra da Mantiqueira in the background? Anyone who is a parent knows the despair that strikes when their child goes missing, even for a few seconds. How to deal with the information that your son disappeared on that immense mountain? Many times, while working on this podcast, this feeling of emptiness, of despair, agonized me. Seu Ivo and Nelma arrive in Piquete and stay at the home of Chefe Gugu, leader of the local scout group. It was the group I mentioned in the first episode, the group that provided logistical support to Patrol 240. Chefe Gugu's house becomes a sort of HQ for Operation Simon for a month. There, they create an information center, alerting the entire Brazilian press, thanks to Seu Ivo's contacts as a journalist. "Because the police didn't allow me to... we want you to stay here in Piquete. I was at Gugu's house, coordinating whatever was necessary. So, I brought my sister-in-law, who had been my secretary, and we set up an office here. From there, I managed to get helicopters, made the necessary phone calls." At Gugu's house, Patrícia, Seu Ivo's youngest daughter and Marco Aurélio's sister, remembers this moment well: "It was a press center meant to receive everyone. My aunt Telma helped as a secretary there. We know that at the time, there was a city anniversary party, they canceled that anniversary, and the mayor's wife mobilized the women there to help prepare food for the volunteers, the people helping with the search, because the delegate said, 'If you don't have experience...' I said, 'No, but I'd like to...' He said, 'You won't solve anything. Quite the opposite. So, you'll be more useful staying here.'" Because of this case alone, there were practically 30 days of search. So, every day at the end of the day, the military personnel and chiefs would come by, and we would have a meeting, and they would comment on the results of the day's search. At Chefe Gugu's house, the atmosphere was one of extreme stress, a sea of information, and also strangers offering help. "There were people in the city who prayed novenas, so they came to ask for a novena at the beginning to participate in the novena, but Nelma's participation wasn't for long because she was in such an intense state that she only lived on medication." Today, Chefe Gugu is deceased, but we will be able to hear his voice here thanks to someone else: Rodrigo Nunes. Rodrigo was a journalism student in 2004 when he did his final project on Marco Aurélio's disappearance, which even became a book. Today, Rodrigo is 41 years old and, besides being a journalist, is the Secretary of Tourism of Piquete. He is recognized as one of the greatest researchers of this story, and many people in the region are fans of his book. On the other hand, some people involved in the case do not find the way he portrayed Marco Aurélio's disappearance correct. "I only had access to some of the podcast's materials and sources thanks to him. And it's the case of this tape recorded in 2004 with Chefe Gugu, who remembers with regret Nelma's despair during those days." "How many times did she say, 'I look here,' she would look at the mountain, she would cry and say, 'My son...' " While Seu Ivo's and Nelma's torment only increased, in Piquete, the other children were cared for by family in São Paulo. Tânia, Nelma's sister, dropped everything and her routine to support her nephews Fábio, Adriana, Patrícia, and Marco Antônio. Tânia affectionately calls Marco Aurélio "Caquélio." "Now, when this thing with Caquélio happened, that he disappeared... they informed me. I said, 'No, this is a nightmare. It's not true. It's a hoax, fake news,' which didn't exist back then, right? Then what happened? I offered to go to their house. My children thought that Caquélio would appear at any moment." This is Marco Antônio, Marco Aurélio's brother. "For me, it wasn't a desperate situation. I was sure that Marco Aurélio would be found in a day or two." This is Adriana, Marco Aurélio's sister. "He disappeared in a mall or something, something quick." "My father called every day at a certain time, at the end of the day, my father would call us to tell us a bit about how it was, how the day went, to know how we were. My mother spoke little with us. My mother was almost unable." "The one who spoke more was my father. My mother lived on medication. I don't remember who cooked at my house. I only remember that the house door was always open, the gate was open, many people at my house, many journalists." Aunt Tânia has a difficult memory: "At that time, I still thought for a long time that it was a nightmare, that I would probably wake up and everything would be normal. But the fact is that this normality would never fully return to the Simon family." [Music] [Music] Back to the mountain. Chronology of Operation Marins. Tuesday, June 11, the second official day of searches. Small notes in the major São Paulo newspapers, and from now on, Ana Bonomi, our executive producer of the podcast, will read excerpts from the press that well illustrate how the search coverage was at the time. "Estadão: Scout Marco Aurélio Simon, 15 years old, son of journalist Ivo Simon, is missing in the mountains of Serra da Mantiqueira. Several groups are working to find Marco Aurélio, hoping to find him unharmed." Remember the idea of the circle around a missing person that I mentioned at the beginning of the episode? So, Marco Aurélio's circle is growing every day. And to make matters worse, winter registers temperatures. "Jornal da Tarde: Temperatures in the Alto da Mantiqueira are reaching minus four to six degrees Celsius in several places. Local guide Carlos Vieira, who is participating in the search, said yesterday that 'It's highly unlikely we'll find the boy alive.' He explained that not even the animals in that region can withstand so much cold. Marco Aurélio was wearing only shorts and a light shirt." June progresses, and the number of people searching for Marco Aurélio and covering the case only increases. A local story soon receives the attention of the country's press. Helena de Gramon's report ends up on Jornal Nacional. "The disappearance of Marco Aurélio has shocked the population and mobilized all the specialized search and rescue police in the São Paulo region. In total, over 200 men are working tirelessly to find the boy." Still on Tuesday, June 11, Operation Marins receives a significant reinforcement: the COE (Special Operations Command). [Music] The COE is a special unit of the São Paulo Military Police that still exists today and operates in highly complex situations such as air accidents, search and capture of wanted individuals in hard-to-reach places, or rescue of missing persons. The COE is composed of police officers who undergo a specialized and difficult course with a low pass rate, sometimes even compared to the US Army. "It's a São Paulo State Police force that lives on the edge. The guys go to places that God save us. The presence of them, oh my God, it helped a lot, a lot. There were places they entered to check the caves and things like that." And an important historical detail: the COE was founded in 1970, at the height of the dictatorship's repressive period, to combat the activities of leftist guerrillas fighting against the regime. One of the COE's main targets was the group led by Carlos Lamarca, a former army captain who was killed in 1971. In my research for the podcast, I heard more than once something like, "The COE never goes in to lose." [Music] "Folha de São Paulo" on Tuesday: With the support of the Vale Fire Department and the arrival of the COE, the work was intensified with several patrols spread across the area. On Wednesday, the Fifth Infantry Battalion of the Army joined, with two helicopters and a plane. The area was extensively searched. The COE's participation marks the peak of the search period. Journalist Paulo Antônio recalls a curious fact from this moment. "This generated this state of commotion, even concern, because every day a new team arrived, and every day the flow of people interested in the case increased, including psychics who appeared saying they had seen... had a vision of Marco Aurélio in a charcoal pit, in a nursing home." And the interesting thing is that all this information from psychics, supposed psychics, or people who wanted to appear, all the information was checked by the teams. "They went to the houses that were there in the valley, there was a farmer's house there... and we went to the houses, asked if they knew anything. 'Did you see a scout and so on?'" Speaking now is Manoel Rocha de Carvalho, who was the jailer at the Piquete police station. He was also called by the operation command to search the lower parts of the mountain. "I searched near the river, in the valleys, in the woods. It was a crisis for my husband here, even there, not at Chefe Gugu's house in Piquete." Operation Simon also advanced. Seu Ivo continued to use his influences and the press. He even managed to get a radar plane from the São Paulo State Secretary of Public Security to assist in the searches. And curiously, at the time, the secretary was none other than Michel Temer, who was then taking his first steps in politics. Thus, little by little, the case moved from the back pages of newspapers to the main headlines. "The HQ of Simon's operation at Gugu's house was always surrounded. I was coming back from the workshop and was about to enter the house when a journalist stopped me. I said, 'Why? I'm the owner of the house.' The journalists stayed here in front." On Friday, the fifth day of searches, the newspaper Folha de São Paulo mentions another obstacle: a fire of unknown causes broke out in the early evening of Thursday on the summit of Morro do Cruzeiro, next to Pico dos Marins, and even hindered part of the work until it was controlled. "It happened a little far from the location. This is journalist Paulo Antônio. Because many people... the dry climate was very dry, cold weather, and the climate was very dry in the Pico region. There was a small fire, not a large one. This happened, this happened five, ten days after the disappearance. Interruption, in terms of, you know, because of fighting it, and also firefighters were on the search. Did someone start the fire? Who set it? There was never an explanation for the fire at Marins." [Music] It is important to remember that Chief Ruan accompanied and helped the police in the searches. The newspaper articles always mention his name. And as I told you in episode 1, we contacted Ruan, who now lives in Manaus and did not want to record an interview for the podcast. But he said we could use his public statements to clarify specific doubts in writing. And another important point was the participation of climbers and speleologists in the operation, assisted by helicopters, using special clothing, ropes for over 1,600 kg, knives, belts with carabiners. "The police searched everything: surfaces, crevices, grottos, and caves. He might be in a hole like this, and all of them are being searched. So, when a team leaves, they see that it's marked, they don't look for it anymore, it's already been searched, they'll go to another side. I believe there are more than 72 crevices." "And with a rope, they threw a large stone tied to the end of the rope into a crevice. The rope didn't reach the bottom. It didn't reach the bottom. Out of 80 meters, 80 to 100 meters. They called a large stone tied to the end, released it, and it didn't reach the bottom. It's impressive." [Music] Caves and more caves and holes are explored every day, and nothing. And then Lieutenant Ayrton was in charge of bringing the bad news to Seu Ivo. "We would bring that feeling of powerlessness to Seu Ivo. 'We didn't find him. Tomorrow we'll go back.' 'We didn't find him. Tomorrow we'll go back.'" Every day dawns as torture for Marco Aurélio's family. June progresses without answers, without any trace of the missing scout. No footprint, no piece of clothing, no hair. [Music] And the fact that Marco Aurélio was a scout generated even more bewilderment. How could someone trained for such situations disappear? Listen to what Chefe Gugu told Rodrigo Nunes. [Music] "All the psychics in this whole thing, only Jesus Christ hasn't called me directly yet. It mobilized the whole of Brazil at the time, right? The whole of Brazil. And it was a stain on the cork." [Music] Two weeks after the start of Operation Marins, the newspaper Folha de São Paulo publishes the following note: "A balance sheet prepared by the PM, COE, and firefighters indicates that all available tracking techniques and personal, material, and natural resources have already been applied in the possible area of disappearance without results." [Music] At this point, you might be asking, with so many people involved, how is it that after two weeks of searches, they found nothing? And then we have to remember that Pico dos Marins is not just any mountain. It is one of the most technical in Brazil. "It's not easy. It's not extremely difficult either, but it requires a bit of physical conditioning, right? For those who are inexperienced, it's good for those who are starting to train, but you need a bit of good physical conditioning." "And the cold." This is Marcelo Cavadas, Sub-Lieutenant of the Fire Department and also a mountaineer in his spare time. I spoke with him at the base of Pico dos Marins shortly before climbing the mountain with our team. "People come very prepared. In 2018, a Frenchman died here. He got lost, descended alone, wore what I think was a base layer underneath and a t-shirt and shorts. He got lost. The temperature dropped, and he died of hypothermia because the mist comes, and you can't see. So, it's a wonderful sport, excellent, but it requires a bit of knowledge and also company. An adventurer who does it alone must be very experienced, must have studied, must be trained to face nature alone." He cites the case of a Frenchman who, in April 2018, climbed Pico dos Marins alone and got lost. The search also mobilized many people, almost 100, including firefighters, COE police officers, and volunteers, in addition to helicopters and drones. They found nothing after 17 days. The search was suspended. The Frenchman's body was only found days later by chance by a farmer in the region who was herding his cattle at the foot of the mountain in Piquete and smelled a strong odor coming from a hard-to-access area. The Frenchman was 54 years old, had the physical fitness of an athlete, and extensive experience as a mountaineer, but he was betrayed by bad weather. According to his GPS data, he traveled over 10 km trying to retrace the correct trail. Police reports indicate he died of hypothermia. If Pico dos Marins can be treacherous for an athlete, imagine for a 15-year-old boy with a severe visual impairment, completely unprepared for the cold, who spent that night there. And if even with all current technology and people searching for more than two weeks, the team didn't find a man who disappeared in 2018, imagine in 1985. Now, there's a crucial point here: despite everything, the Frenchman's body was eventually found. Marco Aurélio's was not. [Music] June 28, Friday, almost three weeks after the searches began. A new blow for the Simon family. A police lieutenant says the following to Folha: "The COE personnel have left because there's nothing more to do here. As the entire forest has been searched several times, we are now only waiting for people from the region to give us information about places that may not have been evaluated yet. Next week, we will conduct new searches. After that, the rescue teams will probably withdraw from Pico dos Marins." Seu Ivo remembered the feeling of that day when we interviewed journalist Paulo Antônio. [Music] "But the searches continued for another five or six days, but little by little, when the father leaves, then everyone started to leave. I stayed there, thinking, 'Internet doesn't work anymore. There's no trace of the boy here.'" [Music] A general discouragement sets in, both for the personnel mobilized in Piquete at the base of the peak and in São Paulo, where Marco Aurélio's siblings were under the care of Aunt Tânia. They reacted as best they could. "Then time started to pass, time started to pass. Aunt, do you think you'll find him?" "I said, 'Let's see.' I remember one day I was looking at the newspaper, and someone looked at me because it was a very large school, Roberto Simonsen, which had over 300, 400 students. And someone turned to me and said, 'Ah, your brother...' I said, 'He won't be found there.' Like, making fun of it, you know? But I had no doubt. I turned around and punched the boy in the face. I think it was one of the few times I fought at school." Finally, the month of July arrives, and the Fire Department also withdraws from the search. 40 days after the search began, they are officially interrupted. [Music] When I interviewed journalist Paulo Antônio at Rádio Mantiqueira, he found the archives with the texts of the articles he wrote at the time. The tapes with the original audio no longer exist, but by reviewing the radio's books, he found part of the written collection. We asked him to read some excerpts from those reports, harsh words that since 1985 have marked the end of the search without any success. "The Cruzeiro Fire Department unit, the last group to persist in the search for scout Marco Aurélio, missing on Pico dos Marins, suspended its activities today and will decide on Monday whether to resume the work or not. This possibility, however, is very remote. There are no longer any hopes of finding Marco Aurélio. The disappearance of the scout, which occupied the headlines in the regional, state, and national press, tends to fall into oblivion. The national press's interest, in fact, dwindles. The case, which had been occupying page after page of newspapers throughout June and July, practically disappears." And here begins the endless climb of Seu Ivo, Nelma, and family: the struggle that extends for years to prevent Marco Aurélio's search from being forgotten. The Simon family then begins to distribute posters, 5,000 posters. "I'll never forget one of the first interviews I filmed with Seu Ivo at his house. He took one of the posters from back then. The photo, printed in black and white, was of his son. The title: 'Seeking Marco Aurélio.'" [Music] "Can you read the text you wrote, please, from the poster?" "He has been missing since June 8th, when he was participating in a climb of Pico dos Marins. The Paulista scout Marco Aurélio Bezerra Simon, son of journalist Ivo Mozares de Simon and professor Nelma Bezerra da Silva. Marco Aurélio is 15 years old, thin, 1.60m tall, 43 kg, with advanced myopia in his left eye. He has brown hair, a small cut scar above his upper lip, and a surgical scar on his abdomen. At the time, he was wearing a scout uniform, a red long-sleeved woolen shirt with beige and brown stripes, gray and black socks, and still wearing his boots. If anyone knows of his whereabouts or has any information, please contact the authorities of this city or his parents." [Music] Operation Marins searched for Marco Aurélio on the peak for over a month without success. "In fact, Marcelo, when my parents returned home, it was very difficult for all of us. My parents didn't know what to say to us, you know? Because my father returned with a great sense of frustration for not having brought Marco Aurélio back. My mother was on medication for a long time. My brother Fábio had to carry my mother. And then one day Fábio turned to my mother and said, 'Mom, Mom, Marco Aurélio disappeared, but you have four more children to take care of.'" "Immense sadness, frustration for the family and for everyone involved. I'm not going back anymore. Only God would have to come back to the mountain and turn it upside down. Everyone would fall. The boy isn't here. And there's no lie that he's somewhere else. I don't know if he's alive or dead. I believe he's alive somewhere in this world, my God." [Music] This is a search that never ended. The family continues to seek answers to the mystery, a secret that the mountain has kept since June 1985. [Music] "It's impossible. A sweep was carried out in the entire region. Was he found? Was there evidence? Did someone kill Marco Aurélio and bury him in that region?" It's a hypothesis, certainly. The same question asked by journalist Paulo Antônio has crossed your mind. And indeed, it crossed the minds of many who were searching for Marco Aurélio on the mountain. We've mentioned it a few times without much detail, but while all these sweeping efforts were happening on the peak, a police investigation was underway in parallel, which even influenced many directions of the searches. "It came to the knowledge of this police station that on the 8th to the 9th past, when carrying out the climb of Pico dos Marins in this municipality, the scout Marco Aurélio Bezerra Bozaja Simon, minor, 15 years old, disappeared and has not been located to date. It is determined that a police inquiry be opened to investigate the facts, taking the following measures: first, attach the police report prepared; second, attach a photocopy of the minor's general registration; third, seize the pair of white fabric gloves found at the site where searches were being conducted to locate the missing minor." In these investigations, suspects began to appear, and the main one is Chief Ruan. I'll tell you more about that in the next episode. [Music] [Music] Now a quick message before we sign off. If you have any information or clues about Marco Aurélio, please contact us at the email: o
