The US-Bangla Airlines suspended all its flights to Nepal on Wednesday, two days after a plane carrying 71 people crashed in Kathmandu, killing at least 51, The Daily Star reported. The accident is believed to be Nepal’s worst aviation disaster since a Pakistan International Airlines aircraft crashed in 1992, causing the death of 167 passengers.
“Our flight operations between Dhaka and Kathmandu have been shut from today due to shortage of aircraft,” US-Bangla Airlines General Manager (Public Relations) Kamrul Islam told the Daily Star. However, he did not announce any timeline for the resumption of flights.
A flight data recorder has been found from the wreckage of the plane.
The airline and airport authorities have blamed each other for the crash. “We suspect wrong signals from Kathmandu air traffic control room might have led to the crash,” US Bangla Airlines Chief Executive Imran Asif said, according to Reuters. “A three-minute conversation between the pilot and the air traffic control before the landing indicated that they sent a wrong signal to the pilot.”
However, airport authorities claimed that the pilot had ignored the control tower’s instructions and approached the runway from the wrong direction. “The airplane was not properly aligned with the runway,” the airport’s General Manager Raj Kumar Chettri said. “The tower repeatedly asked if the pilot was OK and the reply was ‘Yes’.”
The Nepali government has ordered an investigation into the crash.
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