A light plane carrying sightseers for a tour of the Nazca lines in the Peruvian desert has crashed, killing all seven people onboard.

Local police said that the deceased included three Dutch tourists, two Chilean tourists and two Peruvian members of crew.

The plane went down near the Maria Reiche airfield in the city of Nazca, said Brig Juan Tirado, a firefighter with the 82nd Fire Company. “There are no survivors,” he said.

The head of the Nazca police, Cmdr Edgar Espinoza, told journalists that the plane apparently caught fire after hitting the ground.

Aero Santos, the tour company that owns the plane, said the craft carried five tourists, a pilot and a co-pilot.

The Nazca Lines, one of Peru’s most popular tourist attractions, is a Unesco world heritage site home to hundreds of gigantic geoglyphs dating back more than 2,000 years, showing figures that include a hummingbird, monkey, spider, pelican and whale.

The protected 400-square-kilometer (250-square-mile) region, which lies some 450km south of the capital, Lima, between the towns of Nazca and Palpa, is often viewed by tourists from the sky to get the best view of the huge ancient figures.

Source: The Guardian 

BDST: 1524 HRS, FEB 05, 2022
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