Incident
On approach to São Gabriel da Cachoeira Airport, the crew encountered poor weather conditions with low visibility due to fog. On short final, the crew failed to realize that the aircraft's altitude was insufficient. The aircraft subsequently collided with trees and crashed a few hundred meters short of the runway.
Injuries and Damage
All 16 occupants on board were injured, with three sustaining serious injuries. The aircraft was destroyed in the accident.
Probable Cause
The official probable cause listed contributing factors including: Human Factor (Psychological Aspect: the pilot in command adopted an improvisational attitude and likely channeled attention to external references, leading to loss of operational performance; Physiological Aspect: undetermined due to absence of toxicological factors not being effectively verified). Material Factor did not contribute. Operational Factor included deficient instruction (lack of periodic simulator training and cockpit resource management training), deficient supervision (no adequate monitoring of operations by the company, no defined rules or specific operating routines), little flight or aircraft experience by the copilot, influence of the environment (limited visibility), deficient cockpit coordination (no briefing for instrument descent procedure, copilot abandoned monitoring of flight parameters), disabled infrastructure (influence of low NDB accuracy on heading lags undetermined), poor planning (no briefing for instrument descent and approach lost procedures), deficient discipline of flight (pilot continued flight below minimum altitude for operating condition), and adverse weather conditions (marginal conditions with aerodrome closed for IFR operation).