Bridge collapse in Brazil leaves at least 2 dead and a dozen missing

A bridge linking two northern Brazilian states has collapsed, killing at least two people and leaving a dozen others missing, police said Monday. A sulfuric acid spill is complicating the rescue operation.

Footage obtained by local residents showed cars and trucks crossing the Juscelino Kubitschek de Oliveira Bridge when large sections collapsed into a river on Sunday.

Police operating on the border of the northern states of Maranhao and Tocantins said eight vehicles were missing: four trucks, two cars and two motorcycles. Brazil’s police and road department said they launched investigations into the case.

The 533-meter-long (1,748-foot-long) bridge between the cities of Estreito and Aguiarnopolis was built in the 1960s and is 1,300 kilometers (800 miles) north of the capital, Brasilia.

Magnum Coelho, colonel of the local fire office, told reporters that sending divers on rescue operations is dangerous because the Tocantins River could be contaminated by sulfuric acid from one of the missing trucks that fell off the bridge.

The bridge collapse was one of several tragedies in Brazil over the weekend. On Saturday, a collision between a passenger bus and a truck killed dozens of people on a highway in Minas Gerais, a state in southeastern Brazil. On Sunday night, authorities confirmed that the death toll had risen to 41.

Local authorities said on Sunday that the driver of the truck fled and could face criminal liability due to the alleged overweight load that may have caused the accident.

The Minas Gerais state fire department said several people were taken to hospitals near the town of Teófilo Otoni. According to reports, the bus had left São Paulo and was carrying 45 passengers.

Also on Sunday, at least 10 people died after a small plane crashed in Gramado, a southern town popular with tourists. More than a dozen people were injured on the ground, Brazil’s Civil Defense Agency said.

The plane was piloted by Luiz Claudio Galeazzi, a Brazilian businessman who was traveling with his family in the state of São Paulo. Brazil’s Civil Defense Agency said the plane hit the chimney of a house and then the second floor of a building before crashing into a mobile phone shop.