Rescue crew work in the wreckage from a plane that crashed into Colombian jungle with Brazilian soccer team Chapecoense near Medellin, Colombia. — Reuters photo
Members of Brazilian soccer team among 71 passengers killed in the tragedy in the mountains of Colombia
LA UNI N, Colombia: A plane that crashed in the mountains of Colombia, killing 71 people, including members of a Brazilian football team, may have run out of fuel, a Colombian military source told AFP.
“It is very suspicious that despite the impact there was no explosion. That reinforces the theory of the lack of fuel,” the source said Tuesday.
Six people miraculously survived the crash Monday night, but the disaster virtually wiped out an up-and-coming Brazilian football team and sent shock waves through the world of football.
Football legends Pele and Maradona as well as current superstars Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo led tributes to the players of Chapecoense Real, a humble team whose march to glory was cut abruptly short.
Having risen only recently from obscurity, the team was on its way to play in the finals of the Copa Sudamericana, South America’s second-biggest club tournament, when disaster struck.
“The pain is terrible. Just as we had made it, I will not say to the top, but to have national prominence, a tragedy like this happens,” club vice-president Ivan Tozzo told Globo SporTV.
“It is very difficult, a very great tragedy.”
The charter plane reported “electrical failures” around 10.00pm Monday (0300 GMT Tuesday) and crashed soon after near the city of Medellin, its destination, officials said.
The plane’s black box recorders have been found, but there was no word on how long it would take to analyze them.
The dead included most of the team and 20 Brazilian journalists travelling to cover the match.
The six survivors are being treated in hospital, officials said.
“I have just seen the plane and given the state it is in, it is a miracle that six people survived,” said Governor Luis Perez of Antioquia department, where the plane went down.
One survivor, goalkeeper Jackson Follmann, had to have his right leg amputated, said the San Vicente Foundation Hospital outside Medellin.
It reported he was “stabilising” in intensive care.
Colombia’s civil aviation authority initially said 75 people were killed. But it later emerged that four people on the passenger manifest had not boarded the plane — a club official, a journalist,
the mayor of the team’s hometown and the speaker of the state assembly.
“It’s one of those things in life. Only God knows why I ended up staying behind,” said Luciano Buligon, the mayor of Chapeco in southern Brazil.
Crying, Plinio Filho, the head of the club’s advisory council, recalled the players telling him they were off to “chase a dream” as they left.
“The group was like a family. It was a group of friends, where everyone laughed a lot, even in defeat,” he said.
Footage of the club on board the plane before take-off aired on TV channel Gigavision in Bolivia, where the team departed from the city of Santa Cruz after taking a commercial flight from Brazil.
Coach Mauro Stumpf told the TV network he hoped the plane would “bring (us) luck” like it did when the team flew with the same company to a quarter-final match last month.
The British Aerospace 146 airliner entered into operation in 1999 and previously belonged to two other airlines, a spokesman for the manufacturer told AFP.
Specialist sites said the same plane was used two weeks ago to fly the Argentine national team with Messi on board to San Juan, Argentina for a World Cup qualifying match.
Britain’s Air Accidents Investigation Branch said it was sending experts along with representatives of the plane’s manufacturer BAE Systems to Colombia to help with investigations.
The plane went down about 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Medellin, in a remote mountain area called Cerro Gordo. — AFP