Eight people including a town mayor died in northeastern Mexico when the small plane they were travelling in to oversee flood damage plunged to the ground, officials said on Thursday.
The Cessna plane had been carrying the mayor of Piedras Negras, as well as a regional secretary of public works, a civil protection officer, two other employees, a photographer and two crew when it crashed Wednesday, the local government said.
The cause of the crash remained unknown.
Areas around Piedras Negras, across the border from Eagle Pass, Texas, have been hard-hit by floods caused by torrential rains from Hurricane Alex which lashed the region last week, and another storm is on its way.
Relentless rains have raised reservoirs along the US-Mexico border, forcing officials to release water into flooded rivers and evacuate tens of thousands of people.
Authorities evacuated some 18 000 people from the town of Anahuac, in Nuevo Leon state, on Tuesday, for fear that water would overflow from a nearby dam.
Hurricane Alex unleashed heavy rains on the region last week, causing flooding that killed at least 12 people in Nuevo Leon and left widespread devastation in the city of Monterrey.
The US National Hurricane Centre said a new depression producing heavy rainfall in the Gulf of Mexico could strengthen into a tropical storm and reach the US and Mexican coastlines by late Thursday. - Sapa-AFP