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Americas and the Caribbean
WorldAmericas

Argentine dictatorship’s ‘death flight’ plane returned home for a historical reckoning

  • The Short SC.7 Skyvan is the first ever proven in a court to have been used by Argentina’s junta to hurl political detainees to their deaths from the sky
  • The plane will help Argentines reckon with the brutal history of their country’s 1976-1983 military dictatorship, activists say

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Members of human rights organisations walk alongside one of the planes that carried out “death flights”, when detainees were tossed out into the sea during Argentina’s last military dictatorship, on the tarmac of the Jorge Newbery international airport in Buenos Aires, Argentina on Saturday. Photo: AP
Associated Press
Flying from Florida to Buenos Aires usually takes about 10 hours, but the turboprop landing in Argentina on Saturday was no normal plane. It had been en route for 20 days, and many Argentines eagerly refreshed flighttracking software to keep tabs on its progress.
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The Short SC.7 Skyvan carried neither crucial cargo nor VIP passengers. Rather, the plane will be another means for Argentines to reckon with the brutal history of their country’s 1976-1983 military dictatorship.

The plane, which was discovered in the United States, is the first ever proven in a court to have been used by Argentina’s junta to hurl political detainees to their deaths from the sky, one of the period’s most cold-blooded atrocities.

Argentina’s government will add the plane to the Museum of Memory, which is in what was the junta’s most infamous secret detention centre. Known as the ESMA, it housed many of the detainees who were later tossed alive from the “death flights” into the ocean or river.

One of the victims linked to the returned plane was Azucena Villaflor, whose son Néstor disappeared and presumably was murdered early in the dictatorship. After he went missing, she founded the group Mothers of Plaza de Mayo to demand information about disappeared children, and then was herself detained and killed.

Cecilia De Vincenti is the daughter of the late Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo’s founder Azucena Villaflor, who was among the detainees tossed out into the sea on the “death flights” during Argentina’s last military dictatorship. Photo: AP
Cecilia De Vincenti is the daughter of the late Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo’s founder Azucena Villaflor, who was among the detainees tossed out into the sea on the “death flights” during Argentina’s last military dictatorship. Photo: AP

“For us, as family members, it’s very important that the plane be part of history, because the bodies as well as the plane tell exactly what happened,” said Cecilia De Vincenti, Villaflor’s daughter.

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