Officials in Nepal said Monday that hopes of finding any survivors among the 22 people on a small plane that crashed into a Himalayan mountainside the day before were fading, all 22 people on board are presumed dead after no survivors were found.
The De Havilland Canada DHC-6-300 Twin Otter plane crashed 15 minutes after taking off from Pokhara, 125 kilometers (80 miles) west of Kathmandu, on Sunday morning, killing two Germans, four Indians, and 16 Nepalis.
“There is very little chance to find survivors,” Deo Chandra Lal Karna, a spokesman for the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal, said.
21 bodies have been recovered from the wreckage, which was strewn across a steep hill at an altitude of roughly 14,500 feet, by Nepali soldiers and rescue workers.
The search groups had been impeded by the challenging terrain and bad weather. Uniformed rescue personnel was seen in Nepali media retrieving a body from the wreckage and hauling it up a high, grassy ridge on a stretcher using ropes.
Netra Prasad Sharma, the most senior bureaucrat in the Mustang district, where the crash took place, told Reuters by phone, “There is very thick cloud in the area, the search for bodies is going on.”
The plane, operated by privately owned Tara Air, crashed in murky weather on Sunday morning, and Nepal’s army didn’t find the debris until Monday morning.
Jomsom, a major tourist and pilgrimage destination about 80 kilometers (50 miles) northwest of Pokhara, is a 20-minute flight away.
However, five minutes before landing, the plane lost touch with the Pokhara control tower, according to airline officials.
The collision occurred near Nepal’s border with China, in the same location as Mount Dhaulagiri, the world’s seventh highest mountain at 8,167 meters (26,795 ft).
Flight-tracking website Flightradar24 said the aircraft, with registration number 9N-AET, made its first flight 43 years ago
Air accidents are common in Nepal, home to eight of the world’s 14 highest mountains, including Everest, The Himalayan country has some of the most dangerous runways and is prone to air accidents due to bad weather and tricky terrain.
Tara Air – was also involved in a catastrophic accident on the same route in 2016, when a plane carrying 23 people crashed into a mountain, killing everyone on board.
The deadliest known plane disaster in Nepal occurred 30 years ago when all 167 people on board died.
Watch the video report here: Youtube/WION
Leave a Comment