Witnesses described seeing the moment a passenger plane crashed in the Brazilian state of São Paulo killing all 61 people on board.
“When I heard the sound of the plane falling, I looked out the window at home and saw the moment it crashed,” Felipe Magalhães told Reuters news agency.
He ran out of his house, in the city of Vinhedo, to see where the plane had crashed. “Terrified and not knowing what to do, I jumped over the wall,” he said.
Nathalie Cicari lives near the place where the plane crashed and said she was having lunch when she heard a “very loud noise very close by”.
She described it as being similar to the sound of a drone, but “much louder.”
“I went out onto the balcony and saw the plane spinning,” Cicari said. CNN Brazil.
“Within seconds, I realized this was not a normal airplane movement.”
The moment of impact was “terrifying,” she said. She was not injured despite having to evacuate her home, which was filled with a huge cloud of black smoke following the accident.
Another witness named Pietro told Reuters that he saw “a lot of people” breaking into a condominium “to make videos”.
“What I saw was the wreckage of the plane, all that was left was the cabin,” he said.
At Cascavel Airport, in Paraná, where the plane took off to the city of São Paulo, some passengers who missed the Voepass flight spoke about their feelings.
‘Man, it’s such an overwhelming feeling’
Adriano Assis said that when he arrived at the airport there was a lack of information about takeoff and there was no one at the counter to answer questions.
When someone arrived, they told him he couldn’t board yet, he said.
“I even argued with him, but he ended up saving my life,” Assis told a local newspaper, as reported by Brazilian news agency Globo.
Another passenger, José Felipe, was initially going to make a reservation for a Latam flight, but instead tried to board the Voepass plane.
“We thought we would go through Latam, but Latam was closed,” Felipe told Reuters.
“I arrived early, waited, waited, waited, waited and nothing.”
“When it was 11 o’clock I came to look for [information] here,” he continued.
“Then they told me, ‘You’re not getting on this plane anymore because it’s past boarding time. [time] limit.’
“So I fought, I even pushed him a little, I told him: ‘Let me get in, I have to get off on this plane and he said:’ No, I can rebook your ticket.’
“Man, it’s such an overwhelming feeling. I’m here shaking, my legs are here… Only God and I were aware of that moment.”
