Speaker 1: Hello, Avenger listeners, It's Steve Fishman and I'm really glad
Speaker 1: you've tuned in. I hope you love this show as
Speaker 1: much as we do. A quick word on an upcoming
Speaker 1: bonus episode. We're doing a bonus with Miriam, the real Miriam.
Speaker 1: We'll be asking her questions, your questions and getting answers.
Speaker 1: She'll update us on what's going on in her world
Speaker 1: and a lot has Please email your questions or thoughts
Speaker 1: or comments too. Info at Orbitmedia dot fm. Oh And
Speaker 1: Fisher Stevens can answer your questions too. He's our co
Speaker 1: founder and resident oscar Winner. He's an actor you saw
Speaker 1: him in Succession and director of actors like al Pacino
Speaker 1: and Justin Timberlake. For Avenger, he directed Alexis Bledel, who
Speaker 1: voices Miriam. If we're lucky, Alexis who was the star
Speaker 1: of Gilmore Girls and Handmaid's Tale and is the daughter
Speaker 1: of an Argentine. We'll chip in answers to so let
Speaker 1: us know your thoughts and questions, hopes and prayers. Info
Speaker 1: at Orbitmedia dot fm. Thanks. In this episode, the big
Speaker 1: break that Miriam and Johncarlo have been waiting for a
Speaker 1: plane is located and in it a cache of secrets,
Speaker 1: explosive secrets. A quick word about subscriptions. If you love ads,
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Speaker 2: Before we begin, please note that for this story we
Speaker 2: interviewed medium and everyone else for dozens of hours in Spanish.
Speaker 2: We hired actors to voice their words in English.
Speaker 3: It called me by surprise, suddenly there was another journalist
Speaker 3: in Argentina investigating the death flights and seeing it in Pachinadose,
Speaker 3: one of the country's most influential publications. Well, after all
Speaker 3: this time investigating this alone with Giancarlo, this was our
Speaker 3: story and ours alone. So I storm into my boss's
Speaker 3: office at Canalre. I hand him the article and tell
Speaker 3: him we're getting scooped on a huge story. He looks
Speaker 3: at the article and downplays it, telling me, come on,
Speaker 3: you have a lot more than this. I say, sure,
Speaker 3: but look at how close he is.
Speaker 2: From Orbit Media. I'm andres caa was schedo. This is
Speaker 2: Avenger the story of Medium Lewin episode five the flight Logs.
Speaker 2: Medium's boss had been dragging his feet for months, coming
Speaker 2: up with one excuse after another to not pursue this story.
Speaker 2: None of them made sense to Medium, but finally she
Speaker 2: managed to corner him. The story was going to be
Speaker 2: done one way or another. Medium's boss gives in, he
Speaker 2: will run the story. Medium starts working with her colleagues
Speaker 2: at Canal Trece. They want footage of that sky van
Speaker 2: she and Giancarlo had located in Florida.
Speaker 3: We need to see the planes, get our cameras there,
Speaker 3: but we have to be careful. We can't just call
Speaker 3: the owners and say, yeah, hi, we're calling because you
Speaker 3: own an aircraft used for one of the cruelest operations
Speaker 3: during the dictatorship.
Speaker 2: But while they're strategizing, Medium's boss tells her he can't
Speaker 2: afford to center to Florida. Instead, they can hire a
Speaker 2: freelancer he knows there, Bruno Vine.
Speaker 3: So I call Bruno, I explain what we need and
Speaker 3: tell him to schedule a meeting to see the plane
Speaker 3: in for the Lauderdale. I brief him and I tell
Speaker 3: him to be careful that he should not lead with
Speaker 3: the information about the death flights.
Speaker 4: When I get there, I realize the owner is not
Speaker 4: aware of the plane's history and I can't remember why
Speaker 4: it happened. But all of a sudden, he tells me
Speaker 4: he has some documents that came with a plane. I
Speaker 4: had no idea what I was about to find.
Speaker 3: Medium Bruno seeer.
Speaker 2: Bruno confirms it's the plane, and then he tells her
Speaker 2: something unexpected. The plane comes with the flight lugs. Medium
Speaker 2: hangs up with Bruno and he immediately caused Giancarlo.
Speaker 5: I remember when Miriam called me. I was in Rome
Speaker 5: having dinner with friends at the restaurant. I had to
Speaker 5: leave the table and go outside so I could hear
Speaker 5: what she was saying.
Speaker 3: I just hung up the phone with Bruno. In Florida,
Speaker 3: he saw the sky Evan and the owner had no
Speaker 3: clue about its history. He even said he had the
Speaker 3: flight lugs dating back to nineteen seventy six, details roots
Speaker 3: names of each one of those pilots.
Speaker 5: I was excited, not cautious. I told her to stop
Speaker 5: talking about this over the phone. I hung up and
Speaker 5: booked a flight to Buenos Aires right away.
Speaker 2: Once they're both in Buenos Aires, Giancarlo and Medium start
Speaker 2: pouring over the flight lugs. Bruno sent over, but there's
Speaker 2: a snag.
Speaker 5: A bunch of abbreviations and jargon in the logs that
Speaker 5: we don't understand.
Speaker 3: We need someone who knows about planes and how that
Speaker 3: world works to help us decipher the logs.
Speaker 5: I suggest going back to Enrica Pinero, but Medium won't
Speaker 5: have it.
Speaker 3: I was still bitter about Enrique saying no to us earlier. Also,
Speaker 3: Canal Trece had already told me they did not want
Speaker 3: us to use him, because frankly, it's like this petty
Speaker 3: thing where they did not want to inflate his fame
Speaker 3: even more.
Speaker 2: One of Medium's coworkers has connections. She knows another pilot
Speaker 2: who might be able to decipher the flight lugs. She
Speaker 2: sets up a meeting.
Speaker 3: We chose a cafe near Canal Trece.
Speaker 2: Medium arrives a few minutes early. She's holding a plastic
Speaker 2: bag with copies of the flight lugs.
Speaker 3: I sit at a table with a view of a park,
Speaker 3: and it just so happens there's a mural by Mnuaktis.
Speaker 3: She's actually an artist who is imprisoned with me. She
Speaker 3: also survived. It's like a sign we're on the right track.
Speaker 2: Medium orders a coffee and waits. Fifteen minutes go by,
Speaker 2: no pilot. She calls his.
Speaker 3: Phone, It goes straight to voicemail.
Speaker 2: She waits another fifteen minutes.
Speaker 3: I try again, no answer, so I call my colleague
Speaker 3: at Canal Tresi to see if anyone has left a message. No,
Speaker 3: no messages.
Speaker 2: It's clear nobody is showing up. Medium is concerned. The
Speaker 2: pilot seems so willing, and then nothing, no phone call,
Speaker 2: no messages. Medium's antennas go up. Her producers shift gears
Speaker 2: and connect with another pilot.
Speaker 3: We choose a new meeting place away from downtown and
Speaker 3: this guy he shows up.
Speaker 2: By then, Medium knew how the death flights worked. What
Speaker 2: she and gian Carlo couldn't figure out was how this
Speaker 2: was recorded in the logs. The pilot helps and.
Speaker 3: Right away he starts pointing out irregularities that catches attention.
Speaker 3: For example, some flights took a lot longer than usual.
Speaker 3: He tells me that doesn't make sense. A lot of
Speaker 3: these flights are just from one nearby airport to another.
Speaker 3: They shouldn't take very long. So I asked him, could
Speaker 3: these be death flights? Yes, he says absolutely.
Speaker 2: It's exactly what medium needs an expert who can point
Speaker 2: to the inconsistencies, talk about him on camera and say.
Speaker 3: These logs raise serious red flags. That's what we wanted,
Speaker 3: a professional, certified pilot questioning them.
Speaker 2: But when she asks the pilot if he'll go on
Speaker 2: air and say this, he says no, a flat out no.
Speaker 3: He tells me that back in nineteen seventy eight, a
Speaker 3: lot of the military pilots who had flown during the
Speaker 3: first two years of the dictatorship eventually went on to
Speaker 3: work for airlines. Most of them were still active and
Speaker 3: had moved up the ranks. He says he'll only talk
Speaker 3: off the record, that showing his face would be like
Speaker 3: signing his death sentence.
Speaker 2: He's not the only person afraid of this story. It
Speaker 2: turns out that the first pilot she wanted to meet,
Speaker 2: the one who ghosted her, actually fled the country after
Speaker 2: realizing what the meeting was about.
Speaker 3: He freaked out and booked a flight to Uruguay. Didn't
Speaker 3: even tell his mother or wife. He was terrified.
Speaker 2: This is one of the consequences of a country that
Speaker 2: transitioned to democracy but left people who tortured and killed
Speaker 2: operate freely throughout the country.
Speaker 3: Right former torturer, now working normal jobs, still in positions
Speaker 3: of power.
Speaker 2: They were trying to do whatever was necessary to keep
Speaker 2: their past buried.
Speaker 3: In two thousand and eight, a star witness in a
Speaker 3: trial involving crimes by the dictatorship suddenly vanished. That impacted
Speaker 3: a lot of survivors who decided to stop collaborating with
Speaker 3: court proceedings out of fear.
Speaker 5: There was definitely a culture of silence. But we still
Speaker 5: needed an expert and someone who would go on the record.
Speaker 5: So again I insisted we have to talk to Enrica Pinero.
Speaker 5: He's not going to cower.
Speaker 2: He has no fear and he loved to talk. He
Speaker 2: loved to be quoted in the press.
Speaker 3: I hated it, but Giancarlo was right. We had to
Speaker 3: go back to Enrique.
Speaker 2: Medium and Giancarlo are walking through a ritzy part of
Speaker 2: Buenos Aires where a lot of expats live. They pass
Speaker 2: by the botanical garden and arrive at Enrique's film production company.
Speaker 3: It's a two story building with automatic doors. We go in,
Speaker 3: then we're ushered into Enrique's office. He immediately hugs Giancarlo.
Speaker 3: They laugh and exchange some words in Italian.
Speaker 5: We show him the flight logs and video of the
Speaker 5: planeing Florida that Bruno collected. He starts looking at everything, So.
Speaker 6: They bring me this pile of papers, the technical log
Speaker 6: of this plane they found. It's a maintenance document where
Speaker 6: a pilot list the duration of the flight, the departure,
Speaker 6: the names of crew Members's cryptic on purpose. We use
Speaker 6: sort of a traffic lingo. For example, zero point five
Speaker 6: means half an hour.
Speaker 3: So we start seeing how flights that normally take two
Speaker 3: hours were logged as if they had taken more than
Speaker 3: four hours.
Speaker 6: And I come across a number of flights that just
Speaker 6: make no sense from a narrow nautical standpoint. For example,
Speaker 6: there was a flight from arrow Parque to Punta del Indio,
Speaker 6: normally a forty five minute flight. In the log it
Speaker 6: appears as a four hour and fifty minute flight. What
Speaker 6: do you mean? It's ludicrous, Darling, Where are you really going?
Speaker 3: It's incredible. How come these logs weren't destroyed? I mean
Speaker 3: the dictatorship tried so hard to keep the flights a secret.
Speaker 6: Well, normally you don't mess with the technical logs. If
Speaker 6: you want to sell the plane, the new owners have
Speaker 6: to have access to that history. You can't just sell
Speaker 6: or transfer planes without them.
Speaker 2: But Enrique thinks there's another reason the logs weren't destroyed.
Speaker 6: These people lived with a great sense of impunity. They
Speaker 6: really thought they were going to get away with everything,
Speaker 6: and they would never be questioned. I think the Nazis
Speaker 6: in Germany were more careful with destroying evidence than these guys. Now,
Speaker 6: Miriam and jian Carlo they've struck gold.
Speaker 5: Now Rique is fully on board.
Speaker 2: They have to finish filming for the TV report. They
Speaker 2: need footage.
Speaker 3: We just have to go back to the Electra, the
Speaker 3: plane at the Junkyard in Buenos Aires.
Speaker 2: Last time she couldn't go near that plane. It made
Speaker 2: her sick, physically ill. This time, the trip to the
Speaker 2: Junkyard turns into an expedition.
Speaker 3: We had a mini convoy, me, Giancarlo, my producer, and
Speaker 3: the camera operator. We park our cars in a straight
Speaker 3: line outside the gate. I clip on my levelier Mike,
Speaker 3: and I tell the cameraman to start recording.
Speaker 2: The plane is right there waiting for them.
Speaker 3: This huge plane suddenly rises up from the middle of
Speaker 3: all this industrial junk, sustained by two metal columns. I
Speaker 3: get closer to the plane and I can see the
Speaker 3: rust that's eating into the blue and white colors of
Speaker 3: the Argentine flag painted on it. A lone palm tree
Speaker 3: stands at one side, and on the other there are
Speaker 3: stairs connected to the plane's open door. It looks sturdy,
Speaker 3: but we're still told to be careful.
Speaker 2: They walk on board one by one.
Speaker 3: Giancarlo and our cameraman go first. I get closer, I
Speaker 3: start feeling anguish all over again. The cabin was big
Speaker 3: enough for Giancarlo and the cameraman to work freely. My
Speaker 3: producer scanning every corner. He points out a switch with
Speaker 3: a sign next to it the instructions on how to
Speaker 3: use it to open the plane's door in mid air.
Speaker 3: I I freeze for a bit. I think of the
Speaker 3: people who's fall from the sky meant the end of
Speaker 3: their torture. Had some of them woken up from their
Speaker 3: sleep when their skin felt the piercing cold that night,
Speaker 3: or did they stay asleep unconscious until they hit the water.
Speaker 3: This plane was used to throw people to their deaths,
Speaker 3: people I knew, people I loved.
Speaker 2: When they finished filming, Medium finally meets the owner. He
Speaker 2: tells her how he bought the plane as junk, which
Speaker 2: meant it came to him without flight logs.
Speaker 3: He actually planned to turn it into some sort of
Speaker 3: attraction for kids. He wanted to build a candy store
Speaker 3: inside of it.
Speaker 2: When Medium gets back to Canal Trees later that day,
Speaker 2: she calls two other survivors of the asthma for her report.
Speaker 2: She needs their testimony about what happened on Wednesdays, the
Speaker 2: infamous transfer Wednesdays we've mentioned before, when prisoners were put
Speaker 2: on death flights. Medium keeps researching and she finds a
Speaker 2: BBC documentary about the sky Van. It actually in Argentina
Speaker 2: when this one.
Speaker 5: Was delivered in the dock.
Speaker 3: They're celebrating the legacy of the sky Van. Immediately I
Speaker 3: recognize its ID. It was one of the planes on
Speaker 3: our list. That sky Van was used in the death flights.
Speaker 3: They had no clue what they were filming.
Speaker 2: Medium's team is finalizing the report. She starts talking to
Speaker 2: the editor about the potential airtime, but Canal Trece doesn't
Speaker 2: think it's the right time to publish it. Her editors
Speaker 2: say they're worried it's the end of the year. The
Speaker 2: store doesn't fit with the holiday spirit. Canal Trece will
Speaker 2: sit on this story for about another five months.
Speaker 3: Finally, on a very hot night in February twenty ten,
Speaker 3: were huddled together in the studio watching the story as
Speaker 3: it airs on National Television PA.
Speaker 2: That's the voice of the real Medium narrating the report
Speaker 2: starts showing the brown, choppy waters of the river the
Speaker 2: Rio la Plata in total quad de Lolfo Silingo, the
Speaker 2: Navy officer who had confessed to take him part in
Speaker 2: the death flights, is featured throughout the report, saying that
Speaker 2: four thousand people were killed in these flights. Medium speaks
Speaker 2: with survivors, prosecutors, historians. She bluntly asks, why does the
Speaker 2: Navy keep hiding the truth?
Speaker 3: Porqui lamava no the Silla Barda.
Speaker 2: In the footage, you can see her walking inside the
Speaker 2: death plane at the junkyard. She looks around. She has
Speaker 2: straight red hair and wears a black leather jacket.
Speaker 4: All you and contre monto de la Florida HeLa Sotalo soundles.
Speaker 2: There's an interview with the owner of the sky van
Speaker 2: she found in Florida.
Speaker 3: When the Navy purchased it, they bought the option of having.
Speaker 2: The There's footage from the flight lugs that were in
Speaker 2: that plane and then Enrique Pinedo appears, pointing out the inconsistencies,
Speaker 2: raising questions. He's just what the show needed, someone authoritative,
Speaker 2: commanding a role he was born to play. A It
Speaker 2: was all there in Medium's report for Argentina and for
Speaker 2: the world to see. Medium couldn't wait to hear the reaction.
Speaker 3: I remember hugging my producer. We were proud, we were happy.
Speaker 3: We got a call from the higher ups ae Canal Trees,
Speaker 3: but they gave us lukewarm praise.
Speaker 2: Early the next morning, she called Ciancalo to debrief, eager
Speaker 2: to assess the impact of the story.
Speaker 3: I admit it also took me aback.
Speaker 5: The story had zero traction in the newspapers, no coverage
Speaker 5: on the radio.
Speaker 2: It might be a disappointment, a big disappointment after years
Speaker 2: of work. But Medium wasn't going to let go. She
Speaker 2: wasn't going to rest.
Speaker 3: This TV report was just one step in our plan.
Speaker 2: After all, she still hadn't revealed the names of the
Speaker 2: pilots who had to be held responsible. She was thinking ahead.
Speaker 2: Now Medium and Giancadlo turned to the courts, and the
Speaker 2: pilot's names will prove invaluable in the next episode. A
Speaker 2: prosecutor against the junta's leaders, delivers a surprise punch.
Speaker 3: He makes this bold request for every branch of the
Speaker 3: military to surrender all of their lugs for all of
Speaker 3: the planes they've flown during the Junta years.
Speaker 2: From Orbit Media, this is Avenger, the Story of Medium Lewin.
Speaker 2: I'm your host and senior producer Andresca A. Scheedo. The
Speaker 2: series was produced by es Seguielrodrie Sandino and edited by
Speaker 2: Monica Campbell. Original Nicolas Paschela, mixing and mastering Christopher Hoff
Speaker 2: and Austin Smith. Assistant producers andres Feschtenholz and Eleana Gillespian.
Speaker 2: FactCheck Alejandro Marinelli and leonardos Canoni. Legal review Neil Rossini,
Speaker 2: Casting director Paula Gammon Wilson. The executive producers from Orbit
Speaker 2: Media are Steve Fishman Fisher Stevens, Marcy Wiseman, and Katie Springer.
Speaker 2: The voice actors in Avenger include Alexis Blodel as Medium
Speaker 2: Lewin Fulvio de la Volta as Giancarlo Serraudo, Gonzalo Vargas
Speaker 2: as Endrique Pinedo, Edgardo Manono Castro as Bruno Vain, and
Speaker 2: Tom Schuber as Carlos Macosmiliana and Gustavo. This podcast was
Speaker 2: produced in association with Sonodo. The Sonodo executive producers are
Speaker 2: Camilla Victoriano, Joshua Weinstein and Jasmine Romeo. The rest of
Speaker 2: the Sonodo production team includes senior producer Carmin Gratol, editor
Speaker 2: for Rigo Crespo, Producer Paloma Navarro, Nicoletti, Evelyn Give, Marianna Cornello,
Speaker 2: Sara Mota, Manuel Para, Hannah Baram and Tasha Sandoval. Special
Speaker 2: thanks to Radio and Casa and Pomeranek Recording Studios in
Speaker 2: Buenos Aires, and to Medium Newan and Giancarlo Serrado for
Speaker 2: letting us tell their story. Thank you for listening.
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