At a press conference on Friday afternoon, the Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva “I have to deliver some really bad news,” he said, calling for a minute’s silence to remember the 58 passengers and four crew members on board the plane that crashed in Vinhedo, a city northwest of Sao Paulo.
The cause of the crash is unclear but “it appears everyone was killed,” he added.
BREAKING: Voepass Flight 2283 crashes in Vinhedo, Brazil pic.twitter.com/wmpJLVYbB3
— BNO News (@BNONews) August 9, 2024
Voepass, a regional airline based in the state of Sao Paulo, confirmed in a social media post that its Flight 2283 had crashed. It said the plane had taken off from Cascavel, a city in southern Brazil near the borders with Paraguay and Argentina, and was headed to Guarulhos, a suburb of Sao Paulo.
We have received reports that a VoePass ATR 72 has crashed near São Paulo, Brazil. We are currently processing further data from this flight. https://t.co/1MwrzhJ0gU pic.twitter.com/ozBx2sL5lZ
— Flightradar24 (@flightradar24) August 9, 2024
The plane, a twin-engine turboprop ATR-72, was scheduled to take off at 11:50 a.m. local time and land just before 2 p.m., according to FlightAware data.
A woman in Vinhedo, Brazil, said she heard the sound of the plane before she saw it.
“I heard a very loud noise very close to me. I thought it was a drone. I looked up in the sky and saw a plane spinning.” Natalie Chicari He told CNN.
#clock : Voepass Linhas Aéreas Further footage from the site of the ATR 72-500 plane crash.#Vinhedo #Brazil #Plane crash #crash #Cascavel #Guarulhos #Sao Paulo #VoepassAirlines pic.twitter.com/B98fcnZF0R
— upuknews (@upuknews1) August 9, 2024
Another witness said, Felipe MagalhaesHe told Reuters he heard the plane falling. Speaking in Portuguese, he said he looked out the window just as the plane crashed. He rushed to the wreckage, not just to watch but to try to help his neighbours.
“The way it fell, I ran out of the house to go see where it had landed and I saw it had crashed into the house of an elderly couple who we knew from the church. I was scared and didn’t know what to do so I jumped over the wall,” Magalhães said.
The man who missed his flight told Brazilian news outlet Globo that at least 10 people were waiting at the wrong gate, causing him to miss the plane before it even took off.
“They told me, ‘You can’t get on this plane because we’re already over capacity.’ I put a bit of pressure on them. I said, ‘Please let me on this plane, I have to go,’ and they said, ‘You can’t do that, all I can do is rebook your ticket,'” the man, who declined to be named, said.