São Paulo, 10 August 2024 (TDI): A plane has crashed in São Paulo, Brazil, killing all 61 people on board.
The twin-engine turboprop was flying from Cascavel in the southern state of Paraná to Guarulhos airport in São Paulo city when it crashed in the town of Vinhedo, according to Voepass airline.
Video circulating on social media shows a plane descending vertically, spiralling as it falls.
The ATR 72-500 was carrying 57 passengers and 4 crew. Local officials said that there were no survivors.
Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva expressed solidarity with the families and friends of the victims, while São Paulo’s state Governor Tarcísio Gomes de Freitas declared three days of mourning.
The offcals said the flight recorders had been retrieved. ATR, the French-Italian jet maker, said it would co-operate with the probe.
The plane landed in a residential area but no-one on the ground was harmed.
Authorities said that only one home in a local condominium complex was damaged.
Footage showed a large area on fire and smoking wreckage in an area full of houses. Police and fire services arived at the scene.
According to tracking website Flightradar24, the aircraft left Cascavel at 11:56 local time (14:56 GMT). The last signal received from the plane was about an hour and a half later.
Brazil’s civil aviation agency said the aircaft, which was built in 2010, had been “in good operating condition, with airworthiness certificates and valid registration”.
The four crew members on board at the time of the crash were all duly licensed and had valid qualifications, it added.
The nearby town of Valinhos sent twenty emergency personnel to the crash site as part of a joint operation, local officials said.
20 men were mobilised, including three vehicles from the Valinhos Municipal Civil Guard and one vehicle from the Civil Defense, Valinhos City Hall said in a statement.
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ATR said in a statement that it had been informed of a crash involving an ATR 72-500.
Our first thoughts are with all the people affected by this event, it said.
The ATR specialists are fully engaged to support both the probe and the customer.
