Brazil plane crash latest: All 61 people on board killed in fire near Sao Paulo, officials confirm

Data from flight-tracking service Flightradar24 provides additional information on VoePass Flight 2283, which claimed 61 lives.

The flight apparently took off from Cascavel Airport at 11:56 am, 16 minutes late. After a very short taxi, it took off two minutes later and reached an altitude of 17,000 feet at 12:22 p.m. It maintained this altitude for about an hour.

Flightradar24 relies on crowdsourcing of volunteers who receive data sent by aircraft and feed it to the company’s base in Stockholm. Data may not represent the true picture; During the cruise, Flightradar24 showed an incredible range of ground speeds varying from 94 to 357 knots.

A rapid descent begins at 1:21 p.m., with maximum vertical speed reaching 24,000 feet per minute—10 times that of a normal descent and corresponding to a speed of 275 mph. The last data transmission was at 1:22 p.m., showing the plane at 4,100 feet with a vertical speed of more than 12,000 feet per minute, about 140 mph.

The data may help investigators from Brazil’s National Civil Aviation Agency (ANAC) determine the cause of the tragedy.

Both airline VoePass and aircraft manufacturer ATR have released statements about today’s crash.

“It is not yet confirmed how the accident happened or the current condition of those on board,” a statement from VoePass said.

Meanwhile, ATR said it is working to support the investigation into the crash.

“What we can say at this time is that ATR has been informed of an accident involving an ATR 72-500 in Vinhedo, Brazil,” their statement said. “Our first thoughts are with all those affected by this incident. ATR specialists are fully engaged in supporting both the investigation and the customer.

A nearby resident said CNN She was eating lunch when she saw Voepass Flight 2283 crash near her.

He called the accident a “moment of panic” for the town of Vinhedo. She told the store that when the plane crashed near her home, she got down and began to pray.

The plane carrying 68 people hit several houses before crashing, Brazil’s civil defense told CNN.

The president says all passengers of the VoePass flight are presumed dead amid scenes of burning wreckage in a residential area of ​​Sao Paulo state.

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Data from flight-tracking service Flightradar24 provides additional information on VoePass Flight 2283, which claimed 61 lives.

The flight apparently took off from Cascavel Airport at 11:56 am, 16 minutes late. After a very short taxi, it took off two minutes later and reached an altitude of 17,000 feet at 12:22 p.m. It maintained this altitude for about an hour.

Flightradar24 relies on crowdsourcing of volunteers who receive data sent by aircraft and feed it to the company’s base in Stockholm. Data may not represent the true picture; During the cruise, Flightradar24 showed an incredible range of ground speeds varying from 94 to 357 knots.

A rapid descent begins at 1:21 p.m., with maximum vertical speed reaching 24,000 feet per minute—10 times that of a normal descent and corresponding to a speed of 275 mph. The last data transmission was at 1:22 p.m., showing the plane at 4,100 feet with a vertical speed of more than 12,000 feet per minute, about 140 mph.

The data may help investigators from Brazil’s National Civil Aviation Agency (ANAC) determine the cause of the tragedy.

The aircraft that crashed in Brazil was a 14-year-old ATR-27 registered PS-VPB.

Built by a Franco-Italian joint venture, the ATR 72 has been in service since 1989. It seats up to 78 passengers and is described by its maker as “the most fuel-efficient regional aircraft”.

The aircraft type is popular for domestic operations in India, Brazil, New Zealand, Thailand, Russia and Spain’s Canary Islands.

In the UK, passengers are likely to fly the ATR-72 on Aer Lingus regional services operated by Emerald Airlines and Loganair on domestic flights. Like other aircraft types that have been in service for decades, the ATR 72 has been involved in many tragedies in its 35-year history. The event on 9 August 2024 is the 12th.

The first, in 1994, was a domestic flight with American Eagle from Indianapolis to Chicago. The wings froze while the aircraft was in a holding pattern. 68 passengers and crew died.

The next accident occurred a decade later, off the coast of Palermo, in 2005 involving a Tuninter flight from Bari, Italy to Djerba, Tunisia. Engineers incorrectly set the fuel gauge for the smaller ATR-42. Plane runs out of fuel and crashes into mid-ocean at high speed, killing 16; 23 people survived.

Subsequent accidents on domestic flights occurred in Thailand, Cuba, Russia, Laos and Taiwan – two ATR-72s owned by TransAsia Airways crashed within eight months, in July 2014 and February 2015.

The last two fatal crashes before the Brazilian tragedy were domestic flights in countries with poor aviation safety records: Iran in 2018, which killed 65 people, and Nepal in 2023, which killed 72 people.