(Vinhedo) A plane crashed Friday in the region of São Paulo, in the southeast of Brazil, killing all 61 people on board, without it being known for the moment the reasons for its impressive nose-dive into a residential area.
The plane, from the Franco-Italian manufacturer ATR, was carrying “57 passengers and four crew members”, according to the airline Voepass.
It was flying from Cascavel, in the southern state of Parana, to Guarulhos International Airport in São Paulo. After a sudden fall, it crashed at 1:25 p.m. (12:25 p.m. Eastern Time) in Vinhedo, a town of 76,000 people located some 80 km northwest of São Paulo, causing fear among the residents.
“There were no survivors,” the Valinhos city hall, which participated in the rescue operations in the neighboring town of Vinhedo, said in an email to AFP.
PHOTO ANDRE PENNER, ASSOCIATED PRESS
Police officers stand guard near the crash site
Images released by local media showed the plane as it fell at high speed, and others showed a long column of smoke rising from the site of the impact, a neighborhood where there were no casualties among the residents.
An investigation has been opened by the Brazilian Center for Investigation and Prevention of Aeronautical Accidents (Cenipa) to determine the causes of the tragedy.
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva declared three days of national mourning after the “tragic accident.”
” Despair ”
Truck driver Martins Barbosa, 49, was working when he heard about the plane crash, which happened 150 metres from his home. “I thought it might have hit my house, with my son inside,” he told AFP, expressing his “despair” at the time, before being reassured.
“It was horrible, we saw the plane spin around and fall. It was God who saved us, because it was a close call that it (the plane) fell on my house. I’m in shock, I can’t stop shaking,” Vinhedo resident Edna Barbosa told Brazilian television SBT.
Another resident, Ricardo Rodrigues, told local channel Band News that he “saw a lot of bodies on the ground, a lot” at the scene of the accident.
IMAGE FROM A VIDEO TAKEN FROM THE X @BNONEWS ACCOUNT
According to the Brazilian Air Force (FAB), the flight “proceeded normally until 13:20 (12:20 Eastern Time).” But a minute later “the aircraft did not respond to calls” from the control tower, nor did it “report being in an emergency situation or facing adverse weather conditions.”
“The loss of contact with the radar occurred at 1:22 p.m.,” added the FAB.
The aircraft is an ATR 72-500. The manufacturer, a subsidiary of Airbus and the Italian Leonardo, stated in a statement that “ATR specialists are fully committed to supporting the ongoing investigation.”
The black box has been found and will need to be analyzed.
Identification of victims
Military police at the scene said the fire caused by the plane crash had been brought under control. Firefighters, civil defense and air force teams were also deployed.
The recovery of the remains of the victims for their “identification” has begun and “will continue throughout the night,” the governor of the state of São Paulo, Tarcisio de Freitas, announced to the press on site.
PHOTO ANDRE PENNER, ASSOCIATED PRESS
Authorities said the crash did not cause any casualties on the ground among residents of the affected residential area.
The bodies will be transferred to the main morgue in São Paulo, Brazil’s economic capital.
Voepass clarified that “there is no confirmed information yet regarding the circumstances of the accident.”
According to the National Civil Aviation Agency, the aircraft complied with all applicable standards.
The first flight of this aircraft manufactured in France dates back to April 2010, according to the specialist website planespotters.net.
According to Cenipa data, without counting Friday’s, since the beginning of the year Brazil has recorded 108 plane crashes that have caused 49 deaths. In the last ten years, 746 people have died in 1,665 accidents in this country of gigantic dimensions.
In 2007, an Airbus A320 from Brazilian airline TAM missed its landing at Congonhas airport in Sao Paulo and crashed into a cargo ship, killing all 187 people on board and 12 people on the ground.
Two years later, an Air France Airbus A330-230, flying between Rio de Janeiro and Paris, disappeared over the Atlantic in a zone of turbulence with 228 people on board.