Days after Nepal plane crash, Buddha Airlines flight faces technical snag; returns to airport

A Buddha Airlines flight returned back to Nepal's Kathmandu airport due to a technical snag on June 1, according to a media report. The flight took off from Tribhuvan International Airport to Bhadrapur and returned after realising that there was a problem with the plane's tyres, Nepal's news website cited the Civil Aviation Office at the airport as saying. According to a Civil Aviation official, the plane took off from Kathmandu at 10:43 am and returned to the airport soon after, the report said.

The report added that an investigation into the matter was underway. The incident comes days after a Tara airline plane carrying four Indians, two Germans, and 13 Nepali passengers, besides a three-member Nepali crew, crashed in Nepal's mountainous Mustang district, minutes after taking off from the tourist city of Pokhara.

According to a preliminary investigation carried out by the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN), the Canadian-built turboprop Twin Otter 9N-AET plane crashed on Sunday (May 29) at an altitude of 4,200 metres due to bad weather conditions.

Also read: Nepal plane crash: Aviation regulator tightens flight permit rules; scraps pilot's right to take off in bad weather

Nepal being a mountainous country, the weather condition is always fluctuating and it is difficult to operate a flight in the mountain region without a proper weather forecasting mechanism. Nepal, home to eight of the world's 14 highest mountains, including Everest, has a record of air accidents.

On May 31, the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal tightened rules governing domestic flights and made it mandatory for airlines to have clear weather throughout the route of a flight. 

(With inputs from PTI) 

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