Accident
A scheduled domestic flight departed La Manguita Airport in Neiva at 1207 hours local time, bound for San Vicente del Cagúan. The estimated time of arrival was 1245 hours. When no report was received from the aircraft by 1500 hours, Bogotá Control Centre declared an alert, followed by a state of emergency at 1540 hours. On November 11 at approximately 1207 hours, the pilot-in-command of another aircraft spotted the remains of the aircraft at a location called Canón del Paraiso, near Cerro del Diablo. The aircraft carried three crew members and 23 passengers who were killed, while 10 other occupants were rescued.
Probable Cause
The official investigation determined that the primary cause of the accident was pilot error: the pilot-in-command continued to fly under visual flight rules (VFR) in adverse weather conditions on a route not authorized for instrument flight rules (IFR) operations by the Colombian Airways Manual. A contributing cause was an error by other personnel: the dispatcher improperly prepared the passenger and cargo manifests and the load and trim sheet, resulting in the aircraft being overloaded by approximately 1,456 kg.