A Bolivian investigation into a plane crash which killed 71 people last month, including dozens of Brazilian football players, has concluded that the pilot and the airline were directly responsible.
The plane, operated by Bolivian airline LaMia, plunged into a mountainside near the Colombian city Medellin, with only six people surviving.
An audio recording of the pilot suggested the aircraft ran out of fuel.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that an investigation into the crash by the Colombian authorities have since continued.
LaMia’s chief executive, Gustavo Gamboa, and his son, Gustavo Villegas, a former official with Bolivia’s aviation authority, are being held pending trial, even though they have denied any wrongdoing.
The pilot, Miguel Quiroga, who was also a co-owner of the airline, died in the crash.
In a leaked tape, he can be heard warning of a “total electric failure’’ and “lack of fuel’’, but he however did not make a formal distress call.
“The evidence is conclusive. The direct responsibility of this event falls on the pilot and the airline company,” Bolivia’s Public Works and Services Minister Milton Claros, who oversees the country’s aviation authority, told reporters.
The aircraft had been transporting Brazil’s Chapecoense football club to the biggest game in its history, the final of the Copa Sudamericana.
LaMia announced compensations of $165,000 (£134,000) to the victims’ families and survivors, Brazilian website G1 reported.(NAN)
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