May 8, 2024
POKHARA, Nepal (AP) — Nepalese authorities on Tuesday began returning to families the bodies of plane crash victims and were sending the aircraft's data recorder to France for analysis as they try to determine what caused the country's deadliest air disaster in 30 years.
The flight plummeted into a gorge on Sunday while on approach to the newly opened Pokhara International Airport in the foothills of the Himalayas, killing all 72 aboard. Searchers found cockpit voice and flight data recorders on Monday, and on Tuesday shut off a dam to ease efforts to retrieve the last remaining body from the nearly 1,000-foot-deep ravine. Two more bodies were found earlier Tuesday.
The voice recorder would be analyzed locally, but the flight data recorder would be sent to France, said Jagannath Niraula, spokesperson for Nepal’s Civil Aviation Authority. The aircraft’s manufacturer, ATR, is headquartered in Toulouse.
The French air accident investigations agency confirmed it is taking part in the investigation, and its representatives were already on site.
The twin-engine ATR 72-500t, operated by Nepal’s Yeti Airlines, was completing the 27-minute flight from the capital, Kathmandu, to the resort city of Pokhara, 125 miles west.
It’s still not clear what caused the crash, less than a minute’s flight from the airport in light wind and clear skies.
Aviation experts say it appears that the turboprop went into a stall at a low altitude on approach to the airport, but it is not clear why.
From a smartphone video shot from the ground seconds before the aircraft crashed, one can see the ATR 72 “nose high, high angle of attack, with wings at a very high bank angle, close to the ground,” said Bob Mann, an aviation analyst and consultant.
“Whether that was due to loss of power, or misjudging aircraft’s energy, direction or the approach profile, and attempting to modify energy or approach, that aircraft attitude would likely have resulted in an aerodynamic stall and rapid loss of altitude, when already close to the ground,” he said in an email.
The aircraft was carrying 68 passengers, including 15 foreign nationals and four crew members. The foreigners included five Indians, four Russians, two South Koreans, and one each from Ireland, Australia, Argentina, and France. Pokhara is the gateway to the Annapurna Circuit, a popular hiking trail in the Himalayas.
On Tuesday afternoon, more than 150 people gathered at Tulsi Ghat, a cremation ground on the banks of the Seti River in Pokhara, to mourn Tribhuwan Paudel, a 37-year-old journalist and editor at a local newspaper, who died in the crash. As a priest lit the funeral pyre, close friends of Paudel came together to reminisce.
Rishikanta Paudel said Paudel always celebrated his successes. “He would cry with happiness whenever I did something good ... I still feel like he might call me any time now and ask how I am."
Funerals for other victims, many of whom were from the area, are expected in the coming days.
