Four people died early Tuesday when a float at the end of a Carnival parade ran into a power line and caught fire in the southeastern city of Santos, officials said. Three of the victims were pushing the vehicle under the float and the fourth was an onlooker, the office of the mayor of Santos told AFP. Four other people were injured. The float belonged to the fan club of FC Santos, one of Brazil's top football teams, and paid homage to football great Pele, a former Santos player.

Sipping champagne, corporate executives in shorts and company T-shirts ogle Carnival samba queens as the women clad in sequins, feathers and glittery make-up strut their stuff at Rio's Sambodrome. The atmosphere at "Samba Carioca" is laid-back and those present are mostly executives for the French energy giant GDF-Suez, Brazilian bankers and bosses of multinational oil companies lured by Brazil's huge underwater oil reserves.

As world celebrities watched, top samba schools paraded their elaborate fantasy floats and scantily-clad beauty queens Sunday in the fiery highlight of the Rio Carnival. The floats were packed with dancers wearing huge headgear, feathers, sequins, body paint and little else. Inocentes de Belford Roxo was the first school to perform late Sunday at the 72,500-seat Rio Sambodrome, paying a colorful homage to Korean culture in Brazil. The theme called "the Seven confluences of the Han River" invoked the protection of an ancient Korean wind goddess called Yondung Halmoni.

World celebrities flocked to Brazil to see the scantily-clad beauty queens and elaborate floats of the country's top Samba schools compete Sunday in the fiery main event of the famed Rio Carnival. Over the next two nights, 12 schools will perform before a global television audience in the highlight of the five-day extravaganza, a fierce contest watched with the same fervor as football matches in this soccer-mad nation. The school floats are packed with dancers wearing huge headgear, feathers, sequins, body paint -- and little else.