No survivors after plane carrying 61 people crashes in Brazil, authorities say
There are no survivors after a Voepass flight carrying 61 people crashed in Brazil on Friday, according to authorities.
The passenger plane was traveling from Cascavel, Brazil, and was bound for Guarulhos Airport, near Sao Paulo, the airline said.
The plane had 57 passengers and four crew members on board, the airline said. All died in the crash, State of Sao Paulo firefighters confirmed to ABC News.
Voepass had initially said 58 passengers were on board but later updated the number while also confirming that all 61 people on board the plane died.
One ticketed passenger ended up not being on the flight, authorities said.
There is no confirmation of how the accident occurred, the airline said.
Flight 2283 took off without any operational restrictions, with all systems capable of carrying out the flight, Voepass said.
Brigadier Marcelo Moreno, the head of Brazil's aviation accidents agency CENIPA, said that the aircraft didn't communicate any emergency.
"Preliminarily, we have information that there was no information from the aircraft, that it didn't have any kind of emergency," Moreno told reporters, stressing that it's early in the investigation.
CENIPA has possession of the plane's two black boxes, the cockpit voice recorder and the flight data recorder, according to a press release.
The crash was reported to military police at 1:28 p.m. local time.
The 14-year-old two-engine ATR 72 model aircraft was flying at 17,000 feet when it began its rapid descent, according to FlightRadar24.
The plane fell close to a residential building in Vinhedo outside the city of Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo federal police said.
One resident was injured, police said.
Brazil's president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, at an event Friday asked the crowd to observe one minute of silence for the victims of the crash.
Footage of the incident captured the plane falling in a spiral out of the sky followed by a large fireball.
The governor of Sao Paulo is heading back from Vitoria to manage the situation, officials said.
Brazil's civil aviation agency said in a statement they will be investigating.
ATR, the aircraft manufacturer, said its specialists are "fully engaged to support both the investigation and the customer."
"Our first thoughts are with all the individuals affected by this event," the company said in a statement.
Investigators from CENIPA were also on the scene to investigate the incident with the aim of preventing similar accidents from happening again, the Brazilian Air Force said.
"The conclusion of this investigation will take as short a time as possible," the Brazilian Air Force said in a statement.
ABC News' Sam Sweeney contributed to this report.
