At least 67 people killed in Nepal air crash

KATHMANDU, Nepal: At least 67 people were killed when a Yeti Airlines flight crashed in Nepal on Sunday morning, officials have said.
There were 68 passengers, including infants, and four crew aboard the ATR 72 aircraft travelling from Kathmandu to Pokhara.
At least 67 people had been killed in the crash, police official AK Chhetri told reporters, and 31 bodies were taken to a hospital while another 36 remained in the gorge where the plane crashed.
The gorge is between Pokhara’s old airport and its new international airport, media reports cited a Pokhara airport authority officer as saying.

“We don’t know the reason for the crash yet, but the weather was clear,” the official said.
Images and videos posted on social media showed heavy smoke rising after the crash .
Hundreds of rescue workers were scouring the hilltop crash site.
“The plane broke into pieces,” army spokesman Krishna Bhandari was quoted as telling media outlets.
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According to flightradar24.com, the aircraft was 15 years old and “equipped with an old transponder with unreliable data”.
Nepal’s civil aviation authority said there were 15 foreign citizens on the flight – five Indians, four Russians, two South Koreans, and one each from Ireland, Australia, Argentina and France.
Pokhara is a popular tourist destination and is known as the gateway to the Annapurna Circuit, a popular hiking trail in the Himalayas. The new airport was opened on January 1.
The crash is Nepal’s deadliest since March 2018, when 51 people died in a crash-landing at Kathmandu airport. Plane crashes are common in Nepal, which has a poor flight safety record and infrastructure.
Yeti Airlines is Nepal’s second-largest carrier after Buddha Air. In 2018, it was voted one of the world’s worst airlines.