(Kathmandu) A tourist helicopter crashed on Tuesday in Nepal shortly after taking off, killing six people, including five Mexican tourists, members of the same family, Nepalese and Mexican authorities said.
The Manang Air flight was heading for the capital Kathmandu from Lukla, the gateway to climbing expeditions to the highest peak in the world, with the five Mexicans and the Nepalese pilot on board.
Contact with the helicopter was lost eight minutes after takeoff at 10:04 a.m. (12:19 a.m. Eastern Time), Nepalese aviation authorities said in a statement.
“The six bodies were found and brought back to Kathmandu,” said Pratap Babu Tiwari, general manager of Tribhuvan International Airport.
The five Mexicans were members of the same family, a couple and their three children, said the Mexican ambassador to India, Federico Salas.
“It was a family of five who were doing tourism, they went to Nepal,” the ambassador told Mexican news channel Milenio.
Two helicopters were dispatched to conduct the search and organize rescue, but were unable to land at the crash site due to weather conditions.
“Ground crews brought the bodies back to the helicopters that landed in the area,” Tiwari said.
Lhakpa Sherpa, a local resident who was involved in search and rescue operations, described the scene of the tragedy as “very scary”.
“It appears that the helicopter first hit a tree before crashing to the ground. It caused a hole in the ground,” he said.
Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal “expressed his sorrow” over the incident, his cabinet said on Twitter.
Gaps
Nepal has a thriving private fleet of helicopters, ferrying tourists and goods to remote parts of the Himalayas where road access is limited or impossible.
The country is known for its shortcomings in aviation safety, and Tuesday’s incident is the latest in a series of such accidents.
In May, one person was killed and four others injured when a helicopter crashed in eastern Nepal after dropping off goods for a hydroelectric project.
Multiple helicopter crashes claimed the lives of more than a dozen people during rescue and relief operations after the devastating 2015 earthquake in Nepal.
Plane crashes are also common in the Himalayan republic, which is home to remote airstrips that are tricky to access due to their proximity to snow-capped peaks, a challenge even for seasoned pilots.
The weather can also change rapidly in the mountains, creating dangerous flying conditions.
In January, 72 people on a flight to the tourist town of Pokhara died when the plane plunged into a ravine, breaking into pieces and catching fire.
In 2018, a US-Bangla Airlines plane crashed near Kathmandu International Airport, known to be difficult to access, killing 51 people and injuring 20 seriously.
In 1992, in Nepal’s deadliest air crash, all 167 people on board a Pakistan International Airlines plane died when it crashed on approach to Kathmandu airport.
The European Union has banned access to its airspace to all Nepalese airlines for security reasons.