MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Brazil airports have a new chief after deadliest crash

Sergio Brito Gaudenzi is the new airports chief

The head of Brazil's airports authority has been replaced in the wake of the country's worst air crash last month.

Jose Carlos Pereira will be replaced by the president of the Brazilian space agency, Sergio Mauricio Brito Gaudenzi. Some 199 people died when an airliner skidded off a runway and crashed into a building at Sao Paulo's Congonhas airport. Mr Pereira is the second top official to be sacked over the crash, after the defence minister also lost his job. The defence ministry supervises civil aviation in Brazil. It was the new defence minister, Nelson Jobim, who requested that Mr Pereira resign and who announced his resignation. The airports authority, Infraero, has been criticised for allowing the Congonhas runway to be used even though it had not been "grooved" after being surfaced. Grooving helps water escape the surface of the runway. It had been raining heavily on 17 July, the day of the crash - that is one of several possible contributory factors being analysed by investigators. The disaster was the second major air tragedy in Brazil in the space of less than a year. In late 2006, a Gol passenger plane and an executive jet collided over the Amazon, killing more than 150 people.