The wreckage of a crashed twin-engine aircraft with 22 people on board is found on the side of a mountain in Mustang district on 30 May 2022 in Nepal (AFP/Bishal MAGAR)
Fourteen bodies have been found in the wreckage of a plane that crashed on Sunday with 22 people on board on the side of a mountain in Nepal, the country’s Civil Aviation Authority said on Monday.
“Fourteen bodies have been recovered so far, the search continues for the others. The weather is very bad but we were able to get a team to the crash site. No further flights were possible,” he told AFP a spokesman Deo Chandra Lal Karn, the day after the accident.
The aircraft was carrying 19 passengers including two Germans, four Indians and ten Nepalese as well as three crew members.
According to Pradeep Gauchan, a local official, the wreckage is about 3,800-4,000 meters above sea level.
“It’s very difficult to get there on foot. A team was dropped off near the area by a helicopter, but the weather is cloudy at the moment, so flights weren’t possible,” Gauchan told Reuters. AFP.
“The helicopters are on stand-by waiting for the clouds to dissipate,” he added.
Families of passengers wait in tears at Pokhara airport after a plane crashed on May 29, 2022 in Nepal (AFP/Yunish Gurung)
The Civil Aviation Authority confirmed that the plane had “accidentally crashed” at 4,420 meters in the Sanosware area of Thasang Rural Municipality in Mustang District. She did not give details of the cause.
The twin-engine Twin Otter had taken off from the city of Pokhara (central-western Nepal) at 9:55 a.m. (0410 GMT), the second largest city in the country, 200 km west of the capital Kathmandu, before losing radio contact.
He was heading to Jomsom, a popular hiking area in the Himalayas, a 20-minute flight from Pokhara.
– Region difficult to access –
A photo shared by Nepal Army spokesman Narayan Silwal on Twitter showed plane wreckage strewn on the side of a mountain.
Families of passengers from the crashed plane wait outside Pokhara airport on May 29, 2022 in Nepal (AFP/PRAKASH MATHEMA)
The registration number 9N-AET was clearly visible on what appeared to be a piece of wing.
According to the Aviation Safety Network website, the aircraft was manufactured by Canadian company De Havilland and first flew more than 40 years ago in 1979.
Search operations had resumed on Monday morning after being interrupted on Sunday at nightfall.
Dev Raj Subedi, spokesman for Pokhara Airport, said the search tracked GPS, mobile and satellite signals to the crash site.
Tara Air is a subsidiary of Yeti Airlines, a private domestic airline serving many remote areas of Nepal.
Nepalese aviation has boomed in recent years, ferrying tourists, walkers and mountaineers, as well as cargo, to remote and hard-to-reach places by road.
– Grim safety record –
Nepal, an impoverished country in the Himalayas, has a dismal aviation safety record due to insufficient pilot training and maintenance.
Relatives of passengers on the plane that crashed in Nepal near Pokhara airport on May 29, 2022 (AFP/Yunish Gurung)
The European Union has banned all Nepalese airlines from accessing its airspace for security reasons.
The country also has some of the most dangerous tracks in the world, located in the middle of snow-capped peaks.
In March 2018, a plane belonging to the Bangladeshi company US-Bangla Airlines crashed near Kathmandu airport, killing 51 people.
The following year, three people died when a plane failed to take off and hit two helicopters.
The accident occurred at Lukla airport, gateway to Everest, which has the reputation of being one of the airports in the world where it is the most complicated to land and take off.
The deadliest accident dates back to 1992: 167 people were killed on board a Pakistan International Airlines flight near Kathmandu airport.
Two months earlier, a Thai Airways plane crashed in the same area, killing 113 people.
In May, Nepal’s second international airport opened in Bhairahawa, allowing pilgrims from all over Asia to travel to the Buddha’s birthplace in nearby Lumbini.
This project, costing 76 million dollars, should make it possible to offload the international airport of Kathmandu.
© 2022 AFP
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