The bodies of 68 persons who were killed in Sunday morning’s Yeti Airlines plane crash in Pokhara have been taken to hospital.
Kaski’s Chief District Officer Tek Bahadur KC said that 68 bodies have been recovered and taken to Gandaki Hospital until Monday morning.
The bodies are being identified at the hospital itself and 38 bodies have been identified so far, according to Deputy Superintendent of Police Gyan Bahadur Khadka at District Police Office, Kaski.
Around 200 personnel from Nepal Army and over 100 personnel from Armed Police Force and Nepal Police have been deployed at the crash site. They have been scouring the wreckage for four other persons who were also traveling in the ill-fated plane.
Sixty-nine bodies were reported to have been recovered on Sunday. Yeti Airlines had also issued a statement that 69 bodies had been recovered.
However, Chief District Officer KC said on Monday that a total of 68 bodies have been recovered so far with two bodies recovered on Monday morning. He said that only 66 bodies were recovered on Sunday but two of them were counted twice.
Search for four others is underway as their status is unknown, he added.
A Yeti Airlines plane flying to Pokhara from Kathmandu crashed into the Seti gorge at Pokhara-15 at 10:50 Sunday morning.
The plane, which took off from the Tribhuvan International Airport at 10:32 in the morning, was carrying 72 persons including four in the cabin crew. The crash site is about 2 km far from the Pokhara International Airport.
Chief District Officer KC said that the difficult terrain has made it difficult to carry out the search and rescue operation. He said that the rescue teams have been working to conclude the search on Monday itself.
KC said that they are also preparing to hand the bodies over to their families on Monday itself but it seems unlikely as they need to complete the postmortem and paperwork before that.
According to the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal, the rescue team has submitted the black box of the plane to the probe committee formed by the government.
