Jimmy Angel and the bush plane stranded on top of the world's tallest waterfall

In 1937, American bush pilot Jimmy Angel landed a Flamingo monoplane on top of Auyán-tepui, a flat-topped mountain in southeastern Venezuela, and watched the wheels sink into a bog. The airplane, El Río Caroní, would remain stranded on the summit for 33 years. Angel and his three passengers survived an 11-day trek through jungle to reach civilization, and the waterfall he had first spotted from the air four years earlier became known as Angel Falls—the tallest waterfall on Earth at 3,212 feet.

Who Was Jimmy Angel?

James Crawford Angel was born in Springfield, Missouri, around 1899. He worked as a barnstormer, flight instructor, and charter pilot across the American Southwest and Mexico before gold fever pulled him to South America.

Around 1921, a prospector reportedly hired Angel to fly into the highland plateau country of southeastern Venezuela known as the Gran Sabana. Angel later claimed they landed on a tepui—one of the region’s sheer-walled, flat-topped mountains—and pulled gold directly from a riverbed. The prospector died shortly afterward, and Angel spent the rest of his life trying to relocate that river.

Through the late 1920s and into the 1930s, he flew repeated expeditions into the Venezuelan interior. He navigated without radio aids or reliable weather reporting, threading canyons between cloud-wrapped tepuis using little more than a compass and visual landmarks.

How Did Angel Discover the World’s Tallest Waterfall?

On November 16, 1933, Angel was flying over Auyán-tepui—“Devil Mountain” in the indigenous Pemón language. The summit plateau covers roughly 270 square miles, rising 3,000 feet above the surrounding jungle with vertical cliff faces on every side.

As he rounded the shoulder of the mountain, he spotted a ribbon of white water falling off the plateau’s edge. The drop was so immense that the water atomized into mist before reaching the bottom. The Pemón people had long known the falls as Kerepakupai Merú, but Angel’s sighting brought it to international attention.

The total drop measures 3,212 feet—more than half a mile of freefall. The water never hits a pool at the base. It turns to rain.

The Landing on Top of Devil Mountain

Angel wasn’t interested in waterfalls. He wanted to reach the summit plateau to search for gold. On October 9, 1937, he returned to Auyán-tepui in El Río Caroní, a high-wing Flamingo monoplane, carrying three passengers: his wife Marie Angel, his friend Gustavo Heny, and Heny’s gardener, Miguel Delgado.

He identified a marshy area on the summit that appeared flat enough for landing. The wheels touched down, the airplane rolled forward, and the ground gave way. What looked solid from the air was a bog. The wheels dug in, the nose pitched forward, and the propeller struck the mud. El Río Caroní settled into the muck and never moved again.

No one was injured, but the airplane was permanently stuck. Four people were now stranded on top of a 3,000-foot mesa in one of the most remote places on Earth, with no radio capable of reaching help and no rescue party aware of their position.

The 11-Day Trek to Safety

The group had no choice but to walk out. They spent 11 days hacking through dense scrub on the summit, finding a route down the cliff face, and then navigating the jungle below to reach the nearest settlement. Marie Angel reportedly made the entire trek in ordinary shoes—not hiking boots, not jungle gear.

Everyone survived. The story of the stranded airplane and the spectacular waterfall spread through geographic publications and expedition reports over the following years.

How Angel Falls Got Its Name

In 1949, a National Geographic expedition confirmed the height of the waterfall and officially named it Salto Ángel—Angel Falls. The name honors not a celestial being but a Missouri bush pilot who was looking for gold and found something far more significant.

Venezuela’s government later designated the falls and surrounding area as Canaima National Park, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

What Happened to the Airplane?

El Río Caroní remained on top of Auyán-tepui for 33 years, exposed to tropical rain, sun, and wind. The fabric rotted away. The metal corroded. The jungle slowly reclaimed it.

In 1970, the Venezuelan Air Force dismantled the remains, airlifted them out by helicopter, and had the airplane restored. It was placed on display outside the airport in Ciudad Bolívar, the gateway city to the Gran Sabana, where a reconstruction can still be seen today.

What Became of Jimmy Angel?

Angel never found his gold river. He continued flying and searching until 1956, when he suffered a head injury in a landing accident in Panama. He never fully recovered and died on December 8, 1956, at approximately 57 years old.

At his request, his ashes were scattered over Angel Falls—making the same 3,212-foot descent as the water itself.

Key Takeaways

• Jimmy Angel first spotted the falls on November 16, 1933, while searching for gold over Auyán-tepui in Venezuela’s Gran Sabana region.
• His 1937 landing on the summit ended with the airplane stuck in a bog; the four occupants survived an 11-day jungle trek to safety.
• Angel Falls is 3,212 feet tall, making it the highest uninterrupted waterfall in the world—the water atomizes into mist before reaching the ground.
• El Río Caroní sat on the mesa for 33 years before the Venezuelan Air Force retrieved it; the restored aircraft is displayed in Ciudad Bolívar.
• Angel died in 1956, and his ashes were scattered over the waterfall that bears his name—a monument not to gold, but to what flight can reveal when a pilot ventures beyond the chart’s edge.