Authorities and aviation experts struggled on Saturday to piece together what caused a plane crash in Brazil's Sao Paulo state that killed all 61 people on board.
The ATR 72 twin-engined propeller aircraft operated by regional airline Voepass was heading to Sao Paulo’s international airport with 57 passengers and four crew members when it crashed in the city of Vinhedo on Friday.
Video shared on social media showed the ATR-72 aircraft spinning out of control as it plunged down behind a cluster of trees, followed by a large plume of black smoke.
The aircraft smashed into the compound of a gated community but caused no injuries on the ground.
City officials at Valinhos, near Vinhedo, said there were no survivors and only one home in the housing complex had been damaged.
A resident of a nearby building, Daniel de Lima, said he heard a loud noise before looking outside and seeing the plane in a horizontal spiral.
“It was rotating, but it wasn't moving forward,” he told Reuters. “Soon after it fell out of the sky and exploded.”
“I almost believe the pilot tried to avoid a nearby neighbourhood, which is densely populated,” he said.
The head of Brazilian aviation accident investigation centre, Cenipa, said the plane's black box containing voice recordings and flight data had been recovered from the site.
The plane's unusual final circling motion triggered widespread curiosity among aviation experts, especially given a lack of bad weather.
US aviation safety expert Anthony Brickhouse said investigators would look at things like weather and whether the engines and controls were functioning properly as they examine causes for the loss of control in flight.
“From what I've seen it was definitely what we would call loss of control,” he said.
Flightradar data showed significant gyrations in speed before the crash, US aviation safety consultant and former commercial pilot John Cox said.
He said he would want to verify the data but that something “really significant” happened to cause the plane to spin when it came down.
“It appears that there may have been some catastrophic event before that loss of control,” he said.
The crash was the world's deadliest airline since January last year, when a Yeti Airlines plane in Nepal stalled and crashed while making its landing approach, killing 72 people on board. That plane also was an ATR 72, and the final report blamed pilot error.
A report Friday from Brazilian television network Globo’s meteorological centre said it “confirmed the possibility of the formation of ice in the region of Vinhedo,” and local media quoted experts who pointed to icing as a potential cause for the crash.
Marcelo Moura, director of operations for Voepass, told reporters on Friday night that, while there were forecasts for ice, they were within acceptable levels for the aircraft.
Lt Col Carlos Henrique Baldi of the Brazilian Air Force’s centre for the investigation and prevention of air accidents, told reporters that it was still too early to confirm whether ice caused the crash.
The plane is “certified in several countries to fly in severe icing conditions, including in countries unlike ours, where the impact of ice is more significant”, he said.
The centre said earlier that the plane’s pilots did not call for help nor say they were operating under adverse weather. There has been no evidence that the pilots tried to contact controllers of regional airports, either, Ports and Airports Minister Silvio Costa Filho told reporters Friday night in Vinhedo.
Brazil’s Federal Police said it was conducing its own investigation and had sent specialists in plane crashes and the identification of disaster victims to the crash site.
French-Italian plane manufacturer ATR said the company's specialists were “fully engaged to support both the investigation and the customer”.
The ATR 72 generally is used on shorter flights. The planes are built by a joint venture of Airbus in France and Italy’s Leonardo.
With reporting from Associated Press and Reuters
Jordan cabinet changes
In
- Raed Mozafar Abu Al Saoud, Minister of Water and Irrigation
- Dr Bassam Samir Al Talhouni, Minister of Justice
- Majd Mohamed Shoueikeh, State Minister of Development of Foundation Performance
- Azmi Mahmud Mohafaza, Minister of Education and Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research
- Falah Abdalla Al Ammoush, Minister of Public Works and Housing
- Basma Moussa Ishakat, Minister of Social Development
- Dr Ghazi Monawar Al Zein, Minister of Health
- Ibrahim Sobhi Alshahahede, Minister of Agriculture and Minister of Environment
- Dr Mohamed Suleiman Aburamman, Minister of Culture and Minister of Youth
Out
- Dr Adel Issa Al Tawissi, Minister of High Education and Scientific Research
- Hala Noaman “Basiso Lattouf”, Minister of Social Development
- Dr Mahmud Yassin Al Sheyab, Minister of Health
- Yahya Moussa Kasbi, Minister of Public Works and Housing
- Nayef Hamidi Al Fayez, Minister of Environment
- Majd Mohamed Shoueika, Minister of Public Sector Development
- Khalid Moussa Al Huneifat, Minister of Agriculture
- Dr Awad Abu Jarad Al Mushakiba, Minister of Justice
- Mounir Moussa Ouwais, Minister of Water and Agriculture
- Dr Azmi Mahmud Mohafaza, Minister of Education
- Mokarram Mustafa Al Kaysi, Minister of Youth
- Basma Mohamed Al Nousour, Minister of Culture
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Earth under attack: Cosmic impacts throughout history
- 4.5 billion years ago: Mars-sized object smashes into the newly-formed Earth, creating debris that coalesces to form the Moon
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- 50,000 years ago: 50m-wide iron meteor crashes in Arizona with the violence of 10 megatonne hydrogen bomb, creating the famous 1.2km-wide Barringer Crater
- 1490: Meteor storm over Shansi Province, north-east China when large stones “fell like rain”, reportedly leading to thousands of deaths.
- 1908: 100-metre meteor from the Taurid Complex explodes near the Tunguska river in Siberia with the force of 1,000 Hiroshima-type bombs, devastating 2,000 square kilometres of forest.
- 1998: Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 breaks apart and crashes into Jupiter in series of impacts that would have annihilated life on Earth.
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Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
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The burning issue
The internal combustion engine is facing a watershed moment – major manufacturer Volvo is to stop producing petroleum-powered vehicles by 2021 and countries in Europe, including the UK, have vowed to ban their sale before 2040. The National takes a look at the story of one of the most successful technologies of the last 100 years and how it has impacted life in the UAE.
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The specs: 2018 Mercedes-Benz GLA
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Founded over 50 years ago, the National Archives collects valuable historical material relating to the UAE, and is the oldest and richest archive relating to the Arabian Gulf.
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Name: Thndr
Started: 2019
Co-founders: Ahmad Hammouda and Seif Amr
Sector: FinTech
Headquarters: Egypt
UAE base: Hub71, Abu Dhabi
Current number of staff: More than 150
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WHAT IS A BLACK HOLE?
1. Black holes are objects whose gravity is so strong not even light can escape their pull
2. They can be created when massive stars collapse under their own weight
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5pm: Maiden (PA) | Dh80,000 | 1,600m
5.30pm: Maiden (PA) | Dh80,000 | 1,400m
6pm: Liwa Oasis (PA) Group 2 | Dh300,000 | 1,400m
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1. Fasting
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Engine: 2-litre turbocharged
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Points about the fast fashion industry Celine Hajjar wants everyone to know
- Fast fashion is responsible for up to 10 per cent of global carbon emissions
- Fast fashion is responsible for 24 per cent of the world's insecticides
- Synthetic fibres that make up the average garment can take hundreds of years to biodegrade
- Fast fashion labour workers make 80 per cent less than the required salary to live
- 27 million fast fashion workers worldwide suffer from work-related illnesses and diseases
- Hundreds of thousands of fast fashion labourers work without rights or protection and 80 per cent of them are women
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