Authorities prepared Thursday to transport home the bodies of dozens of victims of this week's air tragedy in Colombia as grief turned to anger amid indications the airliner ran out of fuel before slamming into the Andes. Bolivian aviation officials announced they were indefinitely suspending the charter company that operated the flight. Many of the victims were players and coaches from a small-town Brazilian soccer team that was headed to the finals of one of South America's most prestigious tournaments after a fairy-tale season that had captivated their soccer-crazed nation. On Thursday, row upon row of caskets, many covered with white sheets printed with the logo of the Chapocoense soccer team, filled a Medellin funeral home in preparation for being flown home, as family members of some victims gathered there to say their final goodbyes. Grieving relatives of the dead spoke out in disbelief after a recording of conversations between a pilot of the doomed flight and air traffic controllers, as well as the account of a surviving flight attendant, indicated the plane ran out of fuel before crashing late Monday, killing all but six of the 77 people on board. A recording of the flight's final minutes showed the pilot repeatedly requested permission to land because of "fuel problems," although he never made a formal distress call. He was told another plane had been diverted with mechanical problems and had priority, and was instructed to wait seven minutes. As the jetliner circled in a holding pattern, the pilot grew more desperate. "Complete electrical failure, without fuel," he said before the plane set off on a four-minute death spiral. By then the controller had gauged the seriousness of the situation and told the other plane to abandon its approach to make way for the charter jet. But it was too late.<br/>
unaligned
The Bolivian Civil Aviation Authority said Thursday it indefinitely suspended the operating license for LaMia airlines following the deadly crash of its charter plane in Colombia. Officials made the announcement without providing additional details. The LaMia charter flight crashed Monday night while approaching Medellín from Santa Cruz, Bolivia. All but six of the 77 people on board were killed. Colombian authorities said they positively identified all 71 people killed in the mountainside crash, which all but wiped out a soccer team from Brazil. They said that 64 of the passengers who perished were Brazilian, five were Bolivian, one was Paraguayan and one was Venezuelan. Authorities from those countries will now begin repatriating the remains, Colombian officials said.<br/>
Fastjet is considering expanding in South Africa as new CEO Nico Bezuidenhout evaluates growth opportunities for the unprofitable discount airline and says the continent’s most industrialized economy is too big to stay out of. While the Africa-focused carrier already connects Johannesburg with its hubs in Tanzania and Zimbabwe, it has no internal services in South Africa. The market “cannot be ignored,” Bezuidenhout, 40, said in Johannesburg, where he’s relocating Fastjet’s headquarters from London after joining the company in August. Bezuidenhout is starting to identify growth opportunities after beginning a fleet overhaul and cutting weaker routes to reduce costs and stem losses at Fastjet, which he anticipates will break even at a cash-flow level from Q4 2017. The carrier hasn’t made an annual profit since it was started in 2012. The CEO previously ran Johannesburg-based budget carrier Mango Airlines for 10 years and had spells as head of its state-owned parent South African Airways. Bezuidenhout said he’d like to make progress in South Africa next year, though Fastjet would have to comply with regulations that cap foreign ownership of the country’s airlines at 25%. <br/>