Ten Indians, mostly from Tamil Nadu, were among 19 people killed on Sunday when a small plane carrying them crashed near the Nepalese capital while attempting to land after an aerial viewing trip of Mount Everest.
All 19 people, two Americans and a Japanese national, were killed in the crash, officials said. The Beechcraft turboprop plane, broke into pieces. Six Nepalese, including three crew members of Buddha Air were killed in the crash. The incident was also marked by a goof up by Nepalese authorities who initially released a wrong passenger list of the Indians killed in the accident. The BHA 103 flight, which crashed at 7.30 am local time, had taken tourists to view Mount Everest and other high peaks, broke into pieces at Kotdanda hills minutes after losing contact with the control tower, according to Civil Aviation Auth-ority of Nepal (CAAN).
Eight Indians belonged to a group of Tiruchirappalli- based builders. The deceased — all members of the Builders’ Association of India — were in New Delhi from September 21 for an industry conference and had planned in advance for the trip to Nepal. An Indian couple belonging to Gujarat were also among the victims. Among those killed was a Nepalese passenger, who initially survived the crash but succumbed to his wounds in hospital after being rescued from the accident site at Kotdanda near Bishankhunarayan Temple in Lalitpur district, located 20 km east of the capital.
Apart from 13 foreigners, the plane was carrying three Nepalese passengers and a three-member crew, according to the Rescue Coordination Centre, Tribhuvan International Airport, under the CAAN. The rescue efforts were hampered by bad weather in the region.
The Indian nationals killed in the crash were identified as Pankaj Mehta and his wife Chhaya, and eight men from Tamil Nadu — M.V. Marathachalam, M. Manimaran, V.M. Kanak-asabesan, A.K. Krishnan, R.M. Minaxi Sunsaram, K. Thiyagarajan, T. Dhanase-karan and Kattoos Mahal-ingam. 57-year-old Mehta was working as chief of the health section of Unicef, Kathmandu.
According to Mehta's colleagues here, the couple had been here for the past three years and had possibly come from Gujarat.
The eight tourists from Tamil Nadu were staying at Hotel Grand at Tahachal, according to the hotel’s Sales Manager Phurba Sherpa. The two Ameri-cans killed were identified as Andrew Wade and Natalie Neilan, while the Japanese national was identified as Ujima Toshi-nori. The three crew members killed in the crash were Captain J.D. Tam-rakar, Captain P. Adhikari and air hostess A. Shre-stha. A. Simrik Airlines helicopter landed at the accident site at Kotdanda and transported the dead to Kathmandu, according to chief district officer Ratna Raj Pandey. Nepal’s deputy prime minister and home minister Bijaya Kumar Gachhadar visited the Tribhuvan International Airport to take stock of the situation, especially handling of the bodies.