Brazilian authorities have recovered the remains of all 62 passengers from the wreckage of a passenger plane that crashed into a gated community in Sao Paulo.
Footage shared on social media showed the Voepass plane spinning out of control before crashing behind a cluster of trees close to houses in the city of Vinhedo on Friday.
Images later showed the remains of the plane on fire after it plummeted to the ground.
Image: Debris at the crash site. Pic: AP
Despite coming down in a residential area, no one on the ground was hurt.
On Friday, Voepass said the plane was carrying 57 passengers and four crew, but on Saturday the firm confirmed another unaccounted-for passenger was on the flight, putting the number of casualties at 62.
Dario Pacheco, mayor of Vinhedo, said the bodies of the pilot and co-pilot have been identified.
There were 34 male and 28 female bodies in the wreckage, the government said.
The bodies of most of the victims have been moved to Sao Paulo’s police morgue for identification.
Four people with dual citizenship were among those killed – three Venezuelans and one Portuguese woman, said regional airline Voepass, which operated the aircraft.
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The Venezuelans were a four-year-old boy, his mother and grandmother, local outlet Globo News reported, adding that the boy’s dog was also on the flight.
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Moment plane spirals out of control
Authorities are using seat assignments, physical characteristics, documents and belongings such as mobile phones to identify the victims, firefighter Maycon Cristo said at the crash site.
“Once all this evidence has been collected, we will remove the victims from the wreckage and place them in the vehicle to be transported to Sao Paulo,” he said.
Relatives of the victims have travelled to Sao Paulo to provide DNA samples to aid in the identification of the remains, said state civil defence coordinator Henguel Pereira.
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The plane’s so-called “black box”, containing voice recordings and flight data, is undergoing analysis, said Marcelo Moreno, the head of Brazilian aviation accident investigation centre Cenipa.
The plane, an ATR 72 turboprop, was bound for Sao Paulo from Cascavel, in the state of Parana, and crashed around 1.30pm (5.30pm UK time) in Vinhedo, some 80km (50 miles) northwest of Sao Paulo.
The flight tracker website FlightRadar24 noted that in its final minute, the plane’s transponder recorded a vertical speed of between 8,000 and 24,000 feet per minute.
The upper end of that range would translate to a speed of 273 miles per hour.
Image: Security services at the scene. Pic: Reuters
Image: Rescue workers at the scene on Friday. Pic: AP
ATR has said that its specialists were “fully engaged” with the investigation into the crash.
Voepass has not given any indication as to what may have caused the crash.
Source : Sky News
