BELHO HORIZONTE, Brazil — Two small planes crashed in the Metropolitan Region of Belo Horizonte on Saturday, with one pilot dying and his daughter left hospitalized in serious condition.
The first accident involved a Cesna 182 plane which crashed into two houses, approximately 80 meters from the runway of an airport for small flights in the northwest region of Belo Horizonte.
Witnesses describe seeing the plane flying straight through the runway before colliding with the two houses.
Neusa Fátima Gonçalves, who was having lunch at the time of the accident, recalls the noise she heard:
“It was a noise like this: totototo. I thought: what is that? And when I thought what was that, everyone was shouting: get out, get out, get out, get out. Then I left.”
Rescue teams quickly arrived at the scene and had to saw off the fuselage while pouring foam over the plane’s structure due to a large leak in the fuel tank.
Lieutenant André Vinte, commander of the MG Fire Department, said that the two victims were trapped in the hardware and in danger of explosion.
The pilot, a 60-year-old man, died in the crash, while his 36-year-old daughter remains in serious condition. An investigation will be conducted to determine the cause of the accident.
In a separate incident, another single-engine plane carrying six people, including a 2-year-old child and a 3-day-old baby, crashed in a mountain region. Fortunately, no one was injured thanks to equipment triggered at the right time by the pilot.
The ballistic parachute, which exists in some small models, prevented the sudden fall of the plane. The structure of the single engine remained intact.
“People often, when they see a parachute, think that it is an accessory that was included in the plane. In the case of the Cirrus, no. The Cirrus is an aircraft that was designed within a complete safety system,” said pilot and instructor Estevam Velasques.
Technicians from the Third Regional Service for the Investigation and Prevention of Aeronautical Accidents will travel from Rio this Saturday to conduct an inspection of planes in Minas Gerais.
