WASHINGTON — The tiny white Cessna soars gently over the endless expanse of jungle, silhouetted by heavy gray clouds above and shining sinews of the mighty Amazon River far below.
But the single-engine float plane, carrying three American Baptist missionaries and two children, also is targeted in the cross hairs of an infrared video camera mounted beneath a CIA-contract surveillance jet searching for drug runners in Peru.
The video is reality television at its most chilling: After 45 minutes of often-appalling confusion and misinformation--compounded by the three-member CIA civilian crew speaking broken Spanish to an often-uncomprehending Peruvian liaison officer on board--an accompanying Peruvian A-37 fighter jet is ordered to shoot down the plane.
"They're killing me! They're killing us!" missionary pilot Kevin Donaldson suddenly shouts over the radio in Spanish.
Flying 1 1/2 miles behind, the unidentified CIA aircraft commander realizes the mistake. He shouts frantically for the interceptor to stop firing. The American co-pilot simultaneously shouts in English and Spanish: "No! Don't shoot! No mas! No mas!"
It is too late. Smoke pours from the Cessna as it plummets toward the river.
"God," the CIA pilot mutters softly.
The A-37 pilot finally gets the message. "Roger. We're terminating. He's on fire," he radios calmly in Spanish. A moment later: "He won't make it; he won't make it. I think his wings caught fire."
And then, as the bullet-riddled plane hits the Amazon in a plume of white spray, the A-37 pilot adds: "He's already in the water; they're jumping out. Their engine is on fire. . . . They're all jumping out."
Then: "The whole plane is on fire. It's sinking."
The video, gripping transcript and a fact-finding report were released by the State Department on Thursday as part of a joint U.S.-Peruvian investigation into the April 20 accident, which claimed the lives of Veronica Bowers of the Assn. of Baptists for World Evangelism and her recently adopted 7-month-old daughter, Charity. Donaldson suffered bullet wounds; Bowers' husband, James, and 6-year-old son, Cory, were uninjured.
The report assigns no blame but makes clear that both Lima and Washington have increasingly ignored parts of a 1994 joint agreement that set strict procedures for the airborne anti-narcotics program.
