Survivor search ends after Brazil plane crash kills 24

Rescue workers have ended their search following a plane crash which killed 24 people and left four survivors in Brazil's Amazon basin, authorities said Sunday.

An investigation is underway into the cause of the accident which happened on Saturday, with survivors' accounts and officials' initial assessments pointing to engine failure as a possible cause.

The Embraer, chartered by Manaus Aerotaxis, was carrying two crew members and 26 passengers, including children, when it went down after taking off from the city of Coari en route to the inland Amazon basin's largest city, Manaus.

The plane was forced to make an emergency landing in the River Manacapuru, a tributary of the Amazon, between Santo Antonio and the island of Montecristo, some 80 kilometers (50 miles) from Manaus.

Seven children were among those killed, Brazil's Legal Medicine Institute said.

Almost 40 firefighters including nine divers (frogmen) and civil defense officials searched through the night for survivors, but confirmed that just four people survived while the death toll rose from six from late Saturday to 24.

Authorities suspect the plane tried to make an emergency landing at the Panamacapuru airport but went down instead in the river.

The director of Manacapuru Regional Hospital, Marcelo Alves, told local media that survivors had relayed how "they heard one of the motors stop and the plane lost altitude. They hit something and then went nose first into the water," he said.

Some survivors said they were able to jump from a door at the rear of the plane shortly before impact.

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