Miguel Juan Sebastián Piñera Echenique (December 1, 1949 – February 6, 2024) was the President of Chile from 2010 to 2014 and again from 2018 until 2022. He was elected once again in the 2017 presidential election.
Piñera ran for President of Chile in the 2009-2010 election. Since August 2009, he led in opinion polls, competing with Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle, Marco Enríquez-Ominami and Jorge Arrate; all of whom are left-of-center candidates. In the election of December 13, 2009, Piñera placed first in the results by obtaining 44.05 % of the votes, while Frei placed second by obtaining 29.6 % of the votes. Since neither candidate received more than half of the total votes, Chileans returned to the polls for a final run-off election on Sunday, January 17, 2010.[1]
Death
Piñera died in a helicopter crash on Ranco Lake on 6 February 2024. He survived the crash itself, but unable to remove his seat belt, he drowned as a result. The other three people on board were his sister Magdalena, businessman Miguel Ignacio Guerrero with his son Bautista Guerrero, all of whom survived. His body was later recovered from the sunken helicopter in the lake by the Chilean Navy.