At least 68 people were killed when a passenger aircraft crashed into a gorge while landing at a newly opened airport in Nepal‘s central resort town of Pokhara on Sunday, authorities in the country said.
The country’s Civil Aviation Authority posted the announcement to Twitter Sunday, while rescuers were scouring the crash site near the Seti River, about 1.6 kilometers (nearly a mile) away from Pokhara International Airport.
It was not immediately clear what caused the plane to crash.
The twin-engine ATR 72 aircraft operated by Nepal’s Yeti Airlines was carrying 68 passengers, including 15 foreign nationals, and four crew members, Nepal’s Civil Aviation Authority said in a statement.
The foreigners included five Indians, four Russians, two South Koreans, and one each from Ireland, Australia, Argentina and France.
Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, who rushed to the airport after the crash, set up a panel to investigate the accident.
”The incident was tragic. The full force of the Nepali army, police has been deployed for rescue,” he said.
Images and videos shared on Twitter showed plumes of smoke billowing from the crash site as rescue workers, Nepali soldiers, and crowds of people gathered around the wreckage of the aircraft.
Pokhara, located 125 miles west of Kathmandu, is the gateway to the Annapurna Circuit, a popular hiking trail in the Himalayas. Pokhara International Airport began operations only two weeks ago.
Nepal, home to eight of the world’s 14 highest mountains, including Mount Everest, has a history of air crashes.
Last year, 22 people died when a plane crashed on a mountainside in Nepal. In 2018, a US-Bangla passenger plane from Bangladesh crashed on landing in Kathmandu, killing 49 of the 71 people aboard.
In 1992, all 167 people aboard a Pakistan International Airlines plane were killed when it plowed into a hill as it tried to land in Kathmandu.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
