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Search for video game may be why Colombia plane didn’t refuel

The plane carrying a Brazilian soccer team that crashed in Colombia ran out of fuel because its crew searched for a player’s video game before takeoff — a delay that led to a skipped refueling stop en route to Medellin, according to a report.

LaMia Flight 2933, which took off from Santa Cruz de la Sierra in Bolivia, had planned to stop for fuel in Cobija — a Bolivian city bordering with Brazil — but the airport there did not operate after midnight, the Daily Mail reported.

The chartered jet, carrying the Chapecoense team to the Copa Sudamericana final, ran out of fuel while waiting for landing clearance at Medellin — leading Capt. Miguel Alejandro Quiroga to call a desperate mayday.

The charter jet slammed into a mountainside moments later, killing 71 of the 77 people on board, after flying for 20 minutes longer than its four-hour fuel capacity, the paper reported.

The Avro RJ85’s maximum range was 1,600 nautical miles — just short of the distance between Santa Cruz and Medellin.

Bolivia has suspended LaMia’s operating license in the aftermath of the tragedy, The Telegraph reported.

Airline chief Gustavo Vargas has told reporters that Quiroga decided to fly to Medellin without refueling at Bogota.

“The pilot was the one who made the decision. He thought the fuel would last,” Vargas said.

Soccer club official Chinho Di Domenico, who died in the crash, posted a revealing message on Whatsapp right before the plane took off, a player who did not travel with the team told the paper.

Rescue workers search the wreckage.AP

“We all used the group to make jokes … send funny messages and photos, things that would make us laugh,” said Demerson Costa, 30, a defender on the team.

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“Before the games we’d use it to send messages of support, wish everyone good luck. On the day the team left, everyone was encouraging each other, and those of us who weren’t going were telling the others to make us proud,” he said.

“The last message that was sent on the group was from Chinho, making fun of the fact one of the players was holding up the flight from Bolivia because he had forgotten to take his video game out of his bags before it had been dispatched. He said the flight had been delayed as they tried to retrieve it,” he added.

The unnamed player, whose team took off from São Paulo, Brazil, asked for his bag before the players boarded the doomed flight in Santa Cruz.

Demerson said he later sent a message to his best friend on the team, striker Bruno Rangel, 34, who did not survive.

“I wished him a good journey, and good luck, and that when he arrived for him to call me so I knew they’d arrived safely. I sent it at 8 p.m., when the team was already in the air,” Demerson said.

“The message never arrived and still hasn’t been delivered or seen. I waited up that night and kept looking to see if the message had arrived. I remember saying to my wife, ‘Wow! They still haven’t arrived, they must have got delayed,’ and eventually I went to bed.”

Only six people survived the crash.

Crew members Ximena Suarez and Erwin Tumiri were in good condition. The four others were still in intensive care: players Alan Ruschel, Jackson Follmann and Hélio Neto, and journalist Rafel Henzel, the BBC reported.

Neto’s father, Helam, said on Facebook that news of his recovery was giving the family “renewed hope and faith.”

“My son is getting better and better. He has just undergone surgery on his leg and doctors say he will return to football,” he said. “We shall continue praying because we still need his discharge from hospital to see him closely.”

The bodies of the dead were due to be flown out of Medellin on Friday.