Kathmandu: Nepal Army aid it has recovered the last body from the wreckage site of the Tara Air plane that crashed in Nepal's mountainous Mustang district on Sunday with 22 people on board, including four Indians, minutes after taking off from the tourist city of Pokhara.
"The last dead body has been recovered. Arrangement are made to bring the remaining 12 bodies from the crash site to Kathmandu," Nepal Army Spokesperson Brigadier General Narayan Silwal tweeted.
By Monday night, rescuers had recovered 21 bodies from the crash site, said a statement issued by the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN). They resumed their search operation to retrieve the last body, according to the officials.
The turboprop Twin Otter 9N-AET plane went missing on Sunday morning in the mountainous region of Nepal. The Canadian-built plane, flying from Pokhara to the popular tourist town Jomsom in central Nepal, was carrying four Indians, two Germans and 13 Nepali passengers, besides a three-member Nepali crew.
Ten bodies were brought to Kathmandu, while 11 bodies were taken to the base camp from where the rescue operation is being coordinated. President Bidya Devi Bhandari and Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba have condoled the death of crew members and passengers in the plane crash.
The government has formed a five-member commission of inquiry to find out the cause of the plane crash. A preliminary investigation revealed that the aircraft had crashed into the mountains after it swerved to the right, instead of turning to the left due to inclement weather, CAAN Director-General Pradeep Adhikari said. On Monday, the CAAN in a statement said that the plane had crashed at Thasang-2 in Mustang district at the height of 14,500 feet.
The airline's passengers list identified four Indians as Ashok Kumar Tripathy, his wife Vaibhavi Bandekar (Tripathy) and their children Dhanush and Ritika. The family was based in Thane city near Mumbai.
