Football pays tribute to Brazilian team after crash

“Solidarity with the families of the victims and with Brazil”, Santos posted on Twitter.

And Brazilian journalist Paulo Freitas is reporting that Atletico Nacional have asked the South American Football Confederation to award the trophy to Chapecoense.

Chapecoense joined Brazil’s first division in 2014 for the first time since the 1970s and last week qualified for the Copa Sudamericana finals – the equivalent of the UEFA Europa League tournament – after defeating Argentina’s San Lorenzo squad. Seven people initially survived the crash, but one of them died a short time later, authorities said.

The mayor of the southern Brazilian city of Chapeco, home of the ill-fated soccer team, said he and other officials barely missed boarding the plane that crashed. He’s suffered a spinal fracture.

Journalist Rafael Valmorbida is recovering from surgery for chest injuries.

The three other survivors were journalist Rafael Valmorbida, air stewardess Ximena Suarez and flight technician Erwin Tumiri.

Emergency workers have found the black boxes with flight data and cockpit voice recordings from a plane that crashed in the Colombian mountains with a Brazilian football team on board, officials said Tuesday.

News out of South America early Tuesday has confirmed that a plane carrying Brazilian soccer club Chapecoense crashed in Colombia.

Update [9:43 a.m.]: It appears there was some confusion about the official number of survivors.

Whilst their Brasileiro Serie A opponents have offered loan players to the club, free of charge, as well as the suggestion they be free from the threat of relegation for three years.

Team spokesman Andrei Copetti announced the death to The Associated Press.

Seventy-two passengers were confirmed onboard, including 22 members of the Chapecoense Real soccer team-which was traveling to play its first match in the finals of Copa Sudamericana, an worldwide soccer tournament in South America-and 22 journalists.

The head of Colombia’s civil aviation agency says that authorities are not ruling out the possibility the chartered flight carrying a Brazilian soccer team ran out of fuel before crashing.

United Kingdom air accident investigators are being sent to Colombia to help the inquiry into a plane crash carrying players and officials from one of Brazil’s leading football clubs. Reports said 76 died in the crash.