68 Dead In Nepal Plane Crash, 5 Indians Were On Board: 5 Facts

New Delhi: At least 67 people died after a plane carrying 72 crashed into a gorge minutes before it was scheduled to land in Nepal’s Pokhara. The accident is the worst air crash in three decades in the small Himalayan nation.

Here’s your 5-point cheatsheet in this big story:

1. There were 68 passengers, including 15 foreign nationals and six children, and four crew members on board. 53 Nepali, 5 Indian, 4 Russian, 2 Koreans, 1 Argentinian, and one each from Ireland, Australia, and France were in the plane, Yeti Airlines said in a statement. 
2. According to the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN), the aircraft took off from Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport at 10:33 am. It was close to landing at the Pokhara airport, when it crashed into a river gorge on the bank of the Seti River.
3. The crash happened around 20 minutes after the take-off, suggesting the aircraft might have been on the descent. The flight time between the two cities is 25 minutes.
4. Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ called an emergency cabinet meeting soon after the crash, and the Nepal government has formed a five-member commission of inquiry to probe the incident.
5. Nepal’s airline business has been plagued with concerns around safety, and inadequate training of staff. The European Union has since 2013 put Nepal on the flight safety blacklist, ordering a blanket ban on all flights from the Himalayan country into its airspace, after the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) flagged safety concerns.