A plane crash killed 18 people in Nepal on Wednesday, however the pilot is currently receiving treatment in a hospital following the fatal accident, the BBC reported.
The pilot, who was rescued from the crash site after the plane caught fire upon take-off and went down, was the only survivor, according to the BBC. The Saurya Airlines flight, which was carrying 17 company employees and two crew members, was undergoing a test flight from the capital to Pokhara, a Himalayan tourist spot in the country’s west, the BBC reported. (RELATED: GRAPHIC: Horrifying Video Shows The Final Moments Inside Doomed Nepalese Flight)
Plane with 19 onboard crashes during takeoff in Nepal’s Kathmandu, pilot is the lone survivor #NepalPlaneCrash #nepalcrash #KathmanduAirport #kathmanduplanecrash pic.twitter.com/xZ0AQ2leFd
— News18 (@CNNnews18) July 24, 2024
Jagannath Niraula, head of Tribhuvan International Airport, told the BBC that the crash “happened as soon as it left the ground, in not even a minute … As soon as it took off, it turned right [when it] should have turned left.”
Although airport authorities have not yet confirmed the cause of the crash, footage of the accident showed the plane rising above the runway before crashing into flames, the BBC reported.
The #SauryaAirlines plane crashed and caught fire. 18 people killed. The pilot is the only survivor. #Nepal pic.twitter.com/CckliynOBA
— Aiza (@Aiza_B2) July 24, 2024
First responders rushed to the scene but were not able to save the 17 Nepalis and one Yemeni national who perished in the crash, according to BBC.
“Only the captain was rescued alive and is receiving treatment at a hospital,” Tej Bahadur Poudyal, the spokesman for Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport, told Reuters.
The prime minister of Nepal, K.P. Sharma Oli, took to social media to urge people to “be patient” after he visited the crash site, according to Reuters.
Nepal, a country that has eight of the world’s tallest 14 mountains, has a checkered safety record, with nearly 350 people dying in aviation accidents since 2000, Reuters reported.
The mountainous country’s poor safety record has been blamed on unpredictable weather and lax regulations, according to the BBC.
A 1992 crash marked Nepal’s deadliest plane crash when 167 people died in a Pakistan International Airlines Airbus crash in Kathmandu, Reuters reported.
