Brazilian authorities on Saturday completed recovering the our bodies of the 62 individuals who died when their airplane tumbled from the sky, as specialists started analyzing the doomed plane’s black packing containers to find out the reason for the catastrophe.
Movies confirmed the ATR 72-500 airplane in a sickening downward spin Friday earlier than it crashed right into a residential space within the city of Vinhedo, some 80 kilometres (50 miles) northwest of Brazil’s monetary capital Sao Paulo.
The airplane operated by airline Voepass fell nearly vertically, landed on its stomach and exploded in flames, hanging with such drive that it was practically “flattened,” mentioned Sao Paulo hearth lieutenant Olivia Perroni Cazo.
“A complete of 62 our bodies (34 male and 28 feminine) had been recovered and brought to the morgue in Sao Paulo for identification and supply to their households,” the regional authorities mentioned Saturday night.
Two have already been recognized by way of fingerprints, with Vinhedo Mayor Dario Pacheco saying they had been the pilot and co-pilot.
The dual-engine turboprop, constructed by aviation agency ATR, was flying from Cascavel in southern Parana state to Sao Paulo’s Guarulhos Worldwide Airport.
Specialists from Brazil’s Aeronautical Accidents Investigation and Prevention Middle (CENIPA) have begun analyzing two black packing containers recovered from the wreckage, containing cabin conversations and in-flight knowledge, mentioned the middle’s chief, Marcelo Moreno.
It plans to publish a preliminary report “inside an estimated 30 days,” the Brazilian Air Pressure mentioned.
In keeping with the Flight Radar 24 web site, the airplane flew for about an hour at 17,000 toes (5,180 meters), till 1:21 pm (1621 GMT) when it started dropping altitude at a catastrophic price.
Radar contact was misplaced at 1:22 pm, the air drive reported. It mentioned the airplane’s crew “at no time declared an emergency or had been below opposed climate circumstances.”
– ‘No technical issues’ –
ATR, a joint subsidiary of European big Airbus and Italy’s Leonardo, mentioned its specialists will help within the investigation.
The airplane, in use since 2010, was in compliance with present requirements, the Nationwide Civil Aviation Company mentioned, including that the 4 crew members had been all absolutely licensed.
Voepass’s operations director, Marcel Moura, mentioned the airplane had undergone routine upkeep the night time earlier than the accident and that “no technical issues” had been discovered.
Nonetheless, specialists recommended icing of the airplane’s wings could have been behind the accident.
Moura mentioned the airplane was a kind that flies at an altitude “the place there’s a better sensitivity to icing,” however that circumstances Friday had been “inside acceptable parameters for a flight.”
– Nationwide mourning –
The fiery crash reworked the airplane’s fuselage right into a mass of twisted metallic. Regardless of the devastation, there have been no casualties on the bottom.
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has declared three days of nationwide mourning for what was one of many worst aviation accidents within the nation’s historical past.
“It was horrible, horrible… such a tragic tragedy,” mentioned a trembling Lourdes da Silva Astolfo, 67, whose residence is just yards (meters) from the crash web site.
She informed AFP she had first felt a “rumbling, nearly like a tremor,” when she out of the blue noticed the airplane nearly immediately overhead. Seconds later got here the beautiful influence and the horrified screams from neighbours as a thick cloud of acrid smoke billowed outward.
The usually peaceable, wooded enclave the place the airplane got here down noticed a gradual stream Saturday of police automobiles, ambulances and firetrucks.
Voepass mentioned all of the victims had been travelling on Brazilian id paperwork. One lady was a twin citizen of Portugal, and there was additionally a household of three Venezuelans.
It was the worst main air catastrophe in Brazil in 17 years.
In 2007, an Airbus A320 of Brazil’s TAM Airways overran a runway at Sao Paulo’s Congonhas airport and crashed right into a warehouse, killing all 187 on board and 12 runway staff.
AFP