Pilot Said Soccer Team’s Plane Was Out of Fuel, Recording Shows – Voice of America

The pilot of a British-model plane that was carrying a Brazilian soccer club said he ran out of fuel before the crash that killed himself and 70 others late Monday near Medellin, Colombia, a leaked recording showed.

In a four-minute recording of communication from an air traffic tower, obtained by Colombian media outlets, the pilot can be heard repeatedly asking for permission to land because of a “total electric failure” and lack of fuel.

A surviving flight attendant and an Avianca pilot, who was flying nearby and listening to his radio, described the pilot’s desperate pleas. And the audio obtained Wednesday confirmed both accounts.

Authorities were still not ruling out other possibilities, but experts said the lack of an explosion once the jet crashed indicated an uncommon case of running out of fuel in a jet that was flying at its maximum range.

Identifying bodies

Colombian authorities said Wednesday that forensic experts were working on identifying the bodies in order to have the victims repatriated to Brazil. The death toll was lowered from earlier reports of at least 76.

Alfredo Bocanegra, head of Colombia’s civil aviation agency, told reporters that planes must have extra fuel to fly at least 30 to 45 minutes to another airport in a case of an emergency.

Investigators were also considering the possibility of a fuel leak.

“If this is confirmed by the investigators, it would be very painful because it stems from negligence,” Bocanegra told Caracol Radio.

The country’s aviation agency found the airplane’s cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder on Tuesday amid the aircraft debris.

Six people survived the crash. Among them were three members of the Chapecoense soccer team, at least two of them with substantial injuries: a journalist, and two members of the flight crew.

Rescuers carry one of the survivors from the LAMIA airlines charter plane carrying members of the Chapecoense Real football team that crashed in the mountains of Cerro Gordo, municipality of La Union, Nov. 29, 2016.

Brazilian goalkeeper Marcos Danilo Padilha survived the crash but “died while being transferred” to a hospital, officials said.

Doctors had to amputate the leg of reserve goalkeeper Jackson Follman, while defender Helio Neto suffered cranial injuries. Defender Alan Ruschel was the other team survivor. A doctor said he underwent surgery and then was transferred to another hospital for further examination.

Rescue workers at the wreckage of an airplane that was carrying the Brazilian soccer club Chapecoense when it crashed outside Medellin, Colombia, Nov. 29, 2016.

Investigation under way

The plane, owned by the small Venezuelan airline LaMia, was en route from Bolivia to Medellin, where the team was to play in the final of the Copa Sudamericana tournament, when it crashed.

According to reports, the jet was at an altitude of 3,300 meters (10,827 feet) before the accident.

Rescue efforts were hindered by the difficulty in reaching the crash site in the mountainous area and by low visibility.

At the crash site, there were no traces of fuel. John Cox, a retired airline pilot and CEO of Florida-based Safety Operating Systems, told the Associated Press that the fuel issue deserved a careful look.

“The airplane was being flight-planned right to its maximum. Right there, it says that even if everything goes well, they are not going to have a large amount of fuel when they arrive,” Cox said.

“I don’t understand how they could do the flight nonstop with the fuel requirements that the regulations stipulate,” he added.

Chapecoense board member Plinio De Nes said a crisis center had been set up at the team’s headquarters for relatives and friends.

“[Players] told me they were going after this dream, to make the dream turn into reality. We were very moved and shared a lot of this dream with them. The dream is now over,” he told reporters.

People pay tribute to the players of Brazilian team Chapecoense Real who were killed in a plane accident in the Colombian mountains, at the club’s Arena Conda stadium in Chapeco, in the southern Brazilian state of Santa Catarina, Nov. 29, 2016.

The Colombian football squad Atletico National said it was also waiting for more information and offered its support to the Brazilian team, adding that Chapecoense should win the title “as an honorary trophy for its great loss.”

Also on board were more than 20 journalists who were going to cover the Copa Sudamericana soccer match Wednesday.

Members of the press were from several organizations, including Fox Sports Brazil and Globo, a large Brazilian conglomerate, and a variety of FM and AM radio stations in South America.

On Twitter, Chapecoense’s rival called for fans to dress in white and attend a candlelight vigil at the city’s soccer stadium to honor the people who died in the crash.

IN PICTURES: Plane with Brazilian Soccer Team Crashes in Colombia

Plane with Brazilian Soccer Team Crashes in Colombia