What may have caused Brazil plane to crash?

( NewsNation ) — Arthur Rosenberg, a former pilot and aerospace engineer, suspects propeller failure, engine failure and icing may have caused a Brazilian plane to crash outside São Paulo, killing 61 people.

Rosenberg said airplane passengers shouldn’t be concerned and that flying is still safe.

The airline Voepass said that its plane, an ATR 72 twin-engine turboprop, was headed for Sao Paulo’s International Airport Guarulhos with 57 passengers and four crew members aboard when it crashed.

“There’s about 1,000 of these ATRs that are flying the world. They’re predominantly used outside of the United States,” Rosenberg said Friday on “ CUOMO. ” “Everyone agrees these planes and ice do not get along.”

Flightradar24 said data sent from the plane indicated it was diving at 8,000 to 24,000 feet per minute in the last 60 seconds of the flight.

Once the plane entered a “flat spin stall,” Rosenberg said the pilots were “basically flying an experimental airplane.”

“The plane is falling, rolling, spinning. It’s disorienting. … You physically feel it on your body. The level of fright that these people went through defies description,” Rosenberg added.

The Brazilian Air Force center for the investigation and prevention of air accidents said in a statement that pilots didn’t respond to calls from air traffic control in Sao Paulo, nor did they call for help or say they were operating under adverse weather conditions.

In a separate statement, Brazil’s Federal Police officers said they already have begun an investigation, and are dispatching specialists in plane crashes and the identification of disaster victims to help.

he Associated Press contributed to this report.

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