A plane with 61 people on board crashed on Friday afternoon in a residential area of the city of Vinhedo, in the interior of Sao Paulo, Brazil.
The airline said there were 58 passengers and four crew members on board, before later updating the figure to 57. Local authorities say there are no survivors.
On land, only one house was damaged and there were no injuries.
According Voepass Airlinesthe company that owns the aircraft, the plane left Cascavel, in Paraná, and was heading to Guarulhos, Sao Paulo.
Videos circulating on social media show the plane plummeting while spinning in the airThe images show an explosion and black smoke coming out of the impact site.
Formerly known as Passaredo Linhas Aéreas, the company was founded in 1995, serves 37 destinations in all regions of Brazil and transported more than 500,000 passengers in 2023, according to the airline itself.
With 29 years of history, it is considered the oldest brazilian airline to operate in the country.
The President of Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silvacalled for a minute of silence and expressed his “solidarity to the families and friends of the victims.”
“I would like everyone to stand up so we can observe a minute of silence because a plane has just crashed. It seems that everyone has died,” the president said at the start of his speech in the southern state of Santa Catarina.
- A plane crashed in the Brazilian state of Sao Paulo, killing all 57 passengers and 4 crew members on board.
- Authorities say only one home on land was damaged and none of the residents were injured.
- The plane was flying from Cascavel in the southern Brazilian state of Paraná to the main airport in the city of Sao Paulo when it crashed in the town of Vinhedo, according to the airline Voepass.
- Images and videos circulating on social media show a plane descending vertically and spiraling downwards.
- Voepass said there was “no confirmation yet as to how the accident occurred.”
- This is the deadliest air accident in Brazil since 2007, when a TAM plane burst into flames, killing 199 people.
Solidarity with the victims
Scientific, civil and military police personnel have been mobilized to the area.
“Teams from the Medical Legal Institute and those responsible for rescuing the bodies were also sent to reinforce the work,” the local government said.
He Governor Tarcísio de Freitaswho was in a meeting in the state of Espírito Santo, returned to the state of Sao Paulo to go to the municipality of Vinhedo “to accompany the work of the teams,” according to official sources.
“My solidarity with all the victims and those affected by this tragedy,” said the governor.
The neighboring town of Valinhos has sent emergency personnel to the scene, its authorities reported.
“Twenty men were mobilized, including three vehicles from the Valinhos Municipal Civil Guard and one civil defense vehicle,” Valinhos authorities said in a statement.
The National Civil Aviation Agency has issued a statement regretting the accident and expressing its solidarity with the families and friends of the victims.
“ANAC is monitoring the company’s care of the victims and their families, as well as taking the necessary measures to determine the situation of the aircraft and the crew.”
The Franco-Italian manufacturer of the crashed aircraft, ATR, announced after the incident involving one of its aircraft, an ATR 72-500, that it is “fully committed” to support the investigation into the causes of the incident.
This is the Brazil’s deadliest plane crash since 2007when a TAM plane burst into flames, killing 199 people.
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