Brazil, Chile plane crashes kill 69

An airplane carrying 57 passengers and four crew crashed Friday in Brazil’s Sao Paulo state, killing everyone on board, while seven people died on the same day when a small plane they were traveling in crashed in southern Chile.

The Brazilian aircraft, an ATR 72-500 operated by Voepass airline, was traveling from Cascavel in southern Parana state to Sao Paulo’s Guarulhos international airport when it crashed in the city of Vinhedo.

Images broadcast on local media showed a large plane spinning as it plummeted almost vertically, while other footage showed a large column of smoke rising from the crash site in what appeared to be a residential area.

Voepass said it was cooperating with authorities to “determine the causes of the accident,” while giving full assistance to families of the victims on flight 2283.

The plane, a twin-engine turboprop, took off “without any flight restrictions, with all its systems operational,” the company said.

Meanwhile, Chile’s civil aviation authority said. contact was lost with the Piper Navajo aircraft at 9:13 a.m. shortly after it took off from Coyhaique, some 1,700 kilometers south of Santiago.

“The pilot and his six passengers” died, the General Directorate of Civil Aeronautics said in a statement, without specifying the cause of the crash.