Plane crashes in residential neighborhood in Brazil, killing all 61 on board – Daily News

“The company regrets to inform that all 61 people on board flight 2283 died at the scene of the accident,” VOEPASS said in a statement. “At this time, VOEPASS is prioritizing the provision of unrestricted assistance to the families of the victims and is effectively collaborating with the authorities to determine the cause of the accident.”

At an event in southern Brazil, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva asked the crowd to stand and observe a minute of silence as he shared the news.

Firefighters, military police and state civil defense sent teams to the scene. Sao Paulo Public Security Secretary Guilherme Derrite spoke to reporters and confirmed that no survivors had been found. He also said the plane’s black box had been found, apparently intact.

“I thought it was going to fall in our yard,” a neighbor and witness who gave her name only as Ana Lucia told reporters near the crash site. “It was terrifying, but thank God there were no victims among the neighbors. However, it seems that the 62 people on board the plane were the real victims.”

A video obtained by The Associated Press from a bystander and verified shows at least two bodies strewn among the wreckage of the burning plane.

Brazilian television network GloboNews showed aerial images of an area where smoke was billowing from the wrecked fuselage of a plane. Previous GloboNews images showed the plane in a nosedive.

Flightradar24 said data sent from the plane indicated it was flying at a speed of between 8,000 and 24,000 feet per minute in the final 60 seconds of the flight.

The Brazilian Air Force’s Center for Investigation and Prevention of Air Accidents said in a statement that the pilots did not respond to calls from air traffic control in Sao Paulo, nor did they ask for help or say they were operating in adverse weather conditions.

In a separate statement, Brazil’s Federal Police said it had already begun its investigation and was sending specialists in air accidents and disaster victim identification to help.