A twin-propeller aircraft carrying 15 people, including a Colombian lawmaker, Diogenes Quintero, crashed in a mountainous region near the Venezuelan border on Wednesday.
The aircraft departed from the border city of Cúcuta and lost contact with air traffic control shortly before it was scheduled to land in the nearby town of Ocaña at about 5:00 p.m. GMT. “There are no survivors,” an official of the aviation authority told AFP.
The plane was carrying 13 passengers and two crew members. The Cúcuta region is known for its rugged terrain, unpredictable weather conditions and areas controlled by Colombia’s largest guerrilla group, the National Liberation Army.
In a separate report, NDTV disclosed that the government deployed the Colombian Air Force to locate the aircraft and recover the bodies. Local parliamentarian Wilmer Carrillo expressed concern over the incident, saying, “We have received with concern the information about the air accident in which my colleague, Diogenes Quintero, Carlos Salcedo and their teams were travelling.”
Quintero is a member of Colombia’s Chamber of Deputies, while Salcedo is a candidate in the upcoming elections. The crash adds to a history of fatal aviation accidents involving prominent figures in Colombia. AFP