Plane crash claims 18 in Nepal

An airplane has crashed in Nepal, claiming the lives of 18 people.

The airplane on the fleet of Nepal’s Saurya Airlines caught fire after skidding off the runway while taking off at Tribhuvan International Airport in the country’s capital, Kathmandu, on Wednesday.

Officials said the affected plane, carrying two crew members and 17 technicians, was going for regular maintenance to Nepal’s new Pokhara airport, which opened last January.

“Only the captain was rescued alive and is receiving treatment at a hospital,” the spokesman for Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport, Tej Bahadur Poudyal, explained.

Visuals have shown the plane flying a little above the runway and then tilting before it crashed.

Nepal has a poor air safety record; a country often referred to as one of the riskiest places to fly, particularly because of its mountainous terrain.

Also, the country, which is home to eight of the world’s 14 highest mountains, including Everest, has a weather pattern that can change suddenly, and airstrips are typically sited in difficult-to-reach, mountainous areas.

It is on record that nearly 350 people have died in plane or helicopter crashes in the country since 2000.

Just last year, 72 people died in a Yeti Airlines crash, an incident later blamed on the pilot who was said to have cut off power by mistake.

Before the year 2000, the deadliest incident occurred in 1992, when a Pakistan International Airlines Airbus crashed into a hillside while approaching Kathmandu, killing 167 people.