TERROR PLUNGE
Black box reveals final chilling sounds heard on doomed Brazil flight that fell out of the sky killing all 62 on board
The plane was previously labelled an 'old wreck' and was only in service for weeks before the deadly plunge
THE black box retrieved from the doomed Voepass flight has revealed the final chilling sounds heard before all 62 on board plunged to their death.
One last attempt of salvation and terrified screams were captured on the cockpit's voice recorder before the passenger jet crashed in Brazil last Friday.
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According to the transcript, the pilot and co-pilot noted a sharp drop in altitude approximately one minute before the crash, Brazilian television network Globo revealed on Wednesday.
Co-pilot Humberto de Campos Alencar e Silva asked "what was happening" before requesting an increase in power to stabilise the plane and prevent it from falling.
The harrowing two-hour recording ended with terrified screams from inside the aircraft and a loud bang.
Of the 62 victims of the tragedy, 60 have already been identified, with 30 bodies released to their families so far.
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The propellers of the ATR 72-500 are located quite near to the cockpit on top of the fuselage, which investigators claimed it resulted in excessive noise - making it challenging to understand the conversations on board.
But they ensured that they were unable to locate any distinctive warning noises, such as those that would indicate an electrical malfunction, a fire, or an engine failure.
A preliminary report on the crash should be completed in 30 days as no official cause has been determined yet, Globo reports.
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Initial data pointed to the formation of ice on the plane's wings, which experts suggested as a strong probable cause of the crash.
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The hypothesis has neither been confirmed nor ruled out.
Brazil's National Civil Aviation Agency (ANAC) will also be audited by the Federal Court of Auditors.
The audit will evaluate the effectiveness of ANAC's requirements for performing aircraft repairs, the suitability of maintenance businesses' inspection protocols, and the organisation's performance in looking into and handling aviation mishaps.
The Voepass Airlines plane was previously labelled an "old wreck" and was only in service for weeks before the deadly plunge.
Passengers and their families complained about the aircraft just 24 hours before it spiralled down to the ground and exploded in a huge fireball last week.
The plane smashed into a residential area of the city of Vinhedo, with neighbours filming it dropping and crashing.
The tragedy happened at about 1.25pm on Friday Brazilian time after the plane took off at midday.
The Voepass flight had left Cascavel, in the Parana state, and was bound for Guarulhos, in Sao Paulo.
Valinhos City Hall later confirmed all on board were dead and that no residents on the ground were injured or killed.
One grieving mother said that Friday's crash "wasn’t a fatality, it was a crime" after the plane horrifically dropped out of the sky in a death spiral.
Maria de Fátima Albuquerque lost her daughter Arianne Albuquerque Risso in the crash, who was a resident doctor in oncology at the Cascavel Cancer Hospital.
An emotional Mrs Albuquerque told Globo G1 on Sunday: “It wasn’t a fatality, anyone who was on that plane would have died, because it was an old wreck.
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"It wasn’t a fatality, it was a crime. Who can ease my pain? You’ll see me fighting every day."
A tragic passenger on the fatal flight had also sent messages to her family saying she was “scared” of the “old” plane.
Rosana Santos Xavier, 23, had expressed her concern about the ATR 72-500 aircraft in the family chat group shortly after boarding.
She wrote: “I’m so scared of this flight, I swear, it’s an old plane.
“There’s a broken seat, it’s chaos.”
The 23-year-old’s mum, Rosemeire dos Santos Xavier, told her to read a Psalm to calm her nerves.
But she says deep down, she had a bad feeling.
A short while later, Rosemeire saw on the news that a plane had crashed.
Rosemeire told local media: “I panicked. I started running around the house screaming.”
Rosana was heading back to her home in Franco da Rocha near São Paulo, Brazil, after a work trip.
The plane had also been undergoing a series of maintenance shutdowns, Brazilian news programme Fantastico has found.
In March, the Voepass aircraft experienced a hydraulic problem and abnormal contact with the runway that caused "structural damage", leaving the aircraft out of operation for four months.
And just a day before Friday's horror crash, passengers on board the same plane reported suffering from the sweltering heat due to faulty air conditioning.
During the flight, passengers reported that they faced extreme heat due to the malfunctioning air conditioning, with one of them saying the temperature was "unbearable".
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People were trying to cool down as best they could, with one man even taking off his shirt because of the sweltering heat.
The Voepass is the plane crash with the highest number of victims since the doomed TAM flight in 2007 that left 199 dead.
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