POKHARA: At least 67 people were confirmed dead on Sunday after a plane with 72 on board crashed in Nepal, police said, in the Himalayan country’s worst aviation disaster in three decades.
Those on board the ATR 72 twin-engine turboprop aircraft that plummeted into a steep gorge, smashed into pieces and burst into flames in the central city of Pokhara included six children, officials said.
As light faded on Sunday and soldiers extracted bodies with ropes and stretchers out of the 300-metre-deep (1,000-foot) ravine, there was no word on the fate of the five people still unaccounted for.
“We are actively working to retrieve and identify the bodies as soon as possible and hand (them) over to their families,” police official AK Chhetri said at the crash site, which was still smouldering and strewn with aircraft debris, including the mangled remains of wings and passenger seats.
A local official had earlier said that “some survivors” had been taken to hospital, but this was not confirmed by the aircraft’s operator Yeti Airlines or other officials.
Yeti spokesman Sudarshan Bartaula said that 15 foreigners were on board, including five Indians, four Russians and two South Koreans, with one passenger each from Argentina, Australia, France and Ireland. The rest were Nepalis. The flight from Kathmandu slammed into the gorge between Pokhara’s domestic and brand new international airport on Sunday, shortly before 11:00 am (0515 GMT).
An unverified clip shared on social media purportedly showed the plane flying low over a residential area before banking sharply to the left, followed by a loud explosion.
“I was walking when I heard a loud blast like a bomb went off,” said witness Arun Tamu, 44, who was around 500 metres (yards) away and who posted live video of the blazing wreckage on social media. — AFP
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