Brazil identifies 1st 5 victims' bodies in air crash

All the 148 passengers and six crew members aboard the Boeing 737-800 were killed in Brazil's worst-ever air disaster, and 100 bodies have been found so far.

The Medico-Legal Institute (IML) identified the five bodies using fingerprints and information supplied by victims' families.

The IML has been operating under emergency conditions, using three large army tents and undertaking seven autopsies simultaneously.

Brazilian rescue workers carry to a refrigerator truck bagged remains of the victims of Gol airlines flight 1907 that crashed into the Amazon jungle on September 29 in the worst air disaster in Brazil's history, in the Jarinda ranch near the crash site where the Air Force has their base of operations for the rescue October 5, 2006.[Reuters]

The IML has not yet received all the fingerprints of victims and may have to resort to DNA examinations which typically take five days to get results.

The Boeing collided with a small executive jet and then crashed in the remote Amazon jungle.

The executive jet, a Legacy 600 made by Embraer, made an emergency landing at a nearby air force base after the collision, with no casualties.

The crashed airliner belonged to low-cost airlines Gol, Brazil's second largest air carrier. The company said in a statement that the U.S. aircraft giant Boeing had just delivered the jet on Sept. 12.

The Boeing's black boxes had been found earlier and the cause of the accident was under investigation.

Brazil's Defense Minister Waldir Pires said the authorities were investigating why the smaller jet had not been flying at its authorized altitude of 11,000 meters.

The collision took place at 11,300 meters, the authorized altitude for the Gol airliner.

Investigators were also trying to find out how two new aircraft equipped with the latest anti-collision systems could have collided.

Brazilian authorities had suggested that the two pilots of the smaller jet may have turned off their transponder which signaled their location. The two have denied that allegation.