Colombia plane crash: 71 dead and six survivors on flight carrying Chapecoense football team
- 71 killed as Flight 2933 crashes on way to Medellin
- Plane was carrying 77 passengers and crew
- Total was originally announced as 81, but four did not board
- Passengers include Chapecoense football team from Brazil
- Seven found alive, one has since died
A
chartered plane with a Brazilian first division football team crashed near Medellin while on its way to the finals of a regional tournament, killing 71 people, Colombian officials said. Six people survived. The British Aerospace 146 short-haul plane, operated by a charter airline named LaMia, declared an emergency and lost radar contact just before 10pm on Monday (0300 GMT) because of an electrical failure, aviation authorities said.The aircraft, which had departed from Santa Cruz, Bolivia, was transporting the Chapecoense team from southern Brazil for the first leg of a two-game Copa Sudamericana final against Atletico Nacional of Medellin, which was due to be played on Wednesday.
"What was supposed to be a celebration has turned into a tragedy," Medellin mayor Federico Gutierrez said from the search and rescue command centre.The club said in a brief statement on its Facebook page that "may God accompany our athletes, officials, journalists and other guests travelling with our delegation".Dozens of rescuers working through the night were initially heartened after pulling three passengers alive from the wreckage. But as the hours passed, and heavy rainfall and low visibility grounded helicopters and complicated efforts to reach the mountainside crash site, the mood soured to the point that authorities had to freeze until dusk what was by then a body recovery operation.
Among the survivors was a Chapecoense defender named Alan Ruschel, who doctors said suffered spinal injuries. Two goalkeepers, Marcos Danilo and Jackson Follmann, as well as a member of the team's delegation and a Bolivian flight attendant, also survived the crash. However Danilo died a short time later.Also killed was Tiago de Rocha Viera, a 22-year-old forward. A video spread online of Viera's thrilled reaction to learning one week before the crash that his wife Graziele was pregnant with their first child. The plane was carrying 68 passengers and nine crew members. Four other people listed on the flight manifest did not board the plane. Twenty-one of the passengers were journalists, of whom just one survived.
The team, from the small city of Chapeco, was in the middle of a fairy tale season. It joined Brazil's first division in 2014 for the first time since the 1970s and made it last week to the Copa Sudamericana final - the equivalent of the Uefa Europa League tournament - after defeating two of Argentina's fiercest squads, San Lorenzo and Independiente, as well as Colombia's Junior."This morning I said goodbye to them and they told me they were going after the dream, turning that dream into reality," a Chapecoense board member told TV Globo. "The dream was over early this morning."
The team is so modest that its 22,000-seat arena was ruled by tournament organizers too small to host the final match, which was instead moved to a stadium 300 miles (480 kilometers) to the north in the city of Curitiba.
"This is unbelievable, I am walking on the grass of the stadium and I feel like I am floating," Andrei Copetti, a team spokesman, told The Associated Press. "No one understands how a story that was so amazing could suffer such a devastating reversal. For many people here reality has still not struck."
Follow live updates below:
Crash survivors undergo operations in Colombia
- Doctors are treating the six survivors of the crash, Reuters reports.
- Only six people - three players, a journalist and two crew members - survived the disaster on Monday night, and they are all being treated at local hospitals.
- Of the players, reserve goalkeeper Jackson Follmann was recovering from the amputation of his right leg, doctors said.
- Defender Helio Hermito Zampier Neto remained in intensive care with severe trauma to his skull, thorax and lungs.
- Fellow defender Alan Ruschel had spine surgery.
Military helicopter deployed to recover bodies
The Colombian Air Force deployed a military helicopter to retrieve bodies from the plane crash site near the municipality of La Union.
Authorities share image of black boxes
Investigators hope these two devices will help them determine what caused the crash.
Twenty journalists among crash victims
Twenty journalists are among the dead in the airline crash that devastated a Brazilian soccer team, officials said Tuesday.
Colombian aviation authorities said 21 of the 77 people aboard the charter flight were journalists covering the Chapecoense team from southern Brazil and its upcoming South American Cup match in Medellin, Colombia.
One journalist was among the six survivors: Rafael Valmorbida of Radio Oeste Capital, a station in the Brazilian city of Chapeco, where the team is based.
"We lost more than just a team," said the station's website. "We lost friends, partners, colleagues and family members."
Top Brazilian clubs offer to loan players to Chapecoense
Some of Brazil's top clubs say they want to give players to Chapecoense on a free loan for the 2017 season. They also say the club should not be relegated to the second division for three years as it recovers from the disaster.
Details of how this would work financially were not immediately floated.
In further homage, Brazilian champion Palmeiras has made a request to the Brazilian Football Confederation to wear Chapecoense's jersey in its last match of the season.
Business, schools close as Brazilian city plunged into mourning
Businesses closed and schools canceled classes in Chapeco as the small town in southern Brazil plunged into mourning on Tuesday over the loss of its soccer team, Chapecoense, in a plane crash in Colombia.
Hundreds of fans decked out in the club's green and white gathered at its stadium starting in the morning. Large groups remained quietly in the stands until late in day, staring past their banners at the empty green field as the sun beat down.
An improvised shrine outside the player's entrance to the stadium filled up with jerseys, flowers and candles. A poster celebrated, in a child's handwriting, the team's meteoric ascent into top-flight Brazilian soccer.
"They never tired of climbing and now they're in heaven," it read.
Chapecoense's improbable rise to competing for the Sudamericana Cup title had been an inspiration to the agricultural town of some 200,000 people in the remote interior of Santa Catarina state.
The dream ended suddenly when the team's plane crashed late on Monday outside the Colombian city of Medellin, where Chapecoense had been due to face local side Atletico Nacional in Wednesday's Cup final.
Most of the team's players were among the 75 people killed in the crash, Colombian authorities said, as well as local journalists and team officials.
"Our idea is to hold a collective wake here in our beloved stadium because everyone wants to give their support, to give an embrace," said Ivan Tozzo, the team's acting president.
Victim total reduced to 71 dead, 6 injured
Seventy-one people were killed and six survived in the crash, officials have now said, lowering the initial death toll by four.
"Search and rescue operations found 71 victims and six survivors," Colombia's disaster management agency, UNGRD, said in a statement.
The civil aviation authority had initially given a death toll of 75, but it later emerged that four people on the passenger manifest had not in fact boarded the plane.
Flight recorders recovered
Colombia's civil aeronautics agency says it has found the two flight recorders from the airplane.
The agency says in a Twitter message that both of the recorders have been recovered "in perfect condition." That could help determine what caused the British Aerospace 146 to crash.
LaMia, the Bolivian operator of the crashed plane, said on its website - which has since become inaccessible - that its three BAE 146s had a maximum range of around 2,965 kilometers. That's about the same as the distance between Santa Cruz, Bolivia, and Medellin, the route the plane was flying when it went down. The range is not rigid and is dependent on a plane's payload and fuel.
Colombia's aviation authority said initial reports suggest the aircraft was suffering from electrical problems, although investigators were also looking into an account from one of the survivors that the plane ran out of fuel about five minutes from its expected landing at the Jose Maria Cordova airport outside Medellin.
Football stars, clubs pay tribute
- "Brazilian football is in mourning. It is such a tragic loss. My sincere condolences to the families of the deceased. Rest in peace."
- Pele, Brazilian football legend
- "Shocked by the tragedy that happened to Chapecoense Real. Solidarity with the families and friends of all the victims. A hug for the club and for all Brazilian football."
- Cristiano Ronaldo, Real Madrid star
- "It is impossible to believe this tragedy, impossible to believe it happened, impossible to believe that the plane crashed, impossible to believe that athletes, humans were on that plane, impossible to believe that these people left their families."
- Neymar, Barcelona and Brazil striker
- "My deepest condolences to all the families, friends and fans of Chapecoense."
- Lionel Messi, Argentina and Barcelona striker
- "Sadly those lads, who were on the way to becoming a force in football, took the wrong plane."
- Diego Maradona, Argentine great
- "This is a very, very sad day for football. At this difficult time our thoughts are with the victims, their families and friends. FIFA would like to extend its most heartfelt condolences to the fans of Chapecoense, the football community and media organisations concerned in Brazil."
- Gianni Infantino, FIFA President
- "Pray for my teammates please."
- Alejandro Martinuccio, Chapecoense striker who missed the trip due to injury
- "Our thoughts are with Chapecoense and everyone affected by this tragedy and their families. We are speechless."
- Sergio Ramos, Real Madrid captain
- "Deeply affected by Medellin's plane crash. I shared locker with Cleber Santana and it's difficult to reveal how I feel. A huge hug."
- David De Gea, Manchester United goalkeeper who played with Santana at Atletico Madrid
- "My prayers and my solidarity for the survivors, families and friends of Chapecoense in this sad time."
- Colombian striker Radamel Falcao
- "We are deeply shaken by the accident concerning the club of our old player Cleber Santana. Our condolences to the families. Rest in Peace."
- Atletico Madrid, whose former player Santana was club captain at Chapecoense
- "The thoughts of everyone at Manchester United are with Chapecoense and all those affected by the tragedy in Colombia."
- Manchester United, who lost eight players in February 1958 as their plane crashed on take off from Munich airport
- "Real Madrid expresses its sorrow at the tragic air crash involving the Brazilian club Chapecoense and extends its condolences to relatives and friends of the victims. At the same time, wishing an early recovery for the survivors."
- Real Madrid
- "All our support and solidarity is with the victims and the families affected by the Chapecoense Real tragedy in Colombia."
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