On 15 December 2010, a

DHC-6 Twin Otter The de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter is a Canadian STOL (Short Takeoff and Landing) utility aircraft developed by de Havilland Canada, which produced the aircraft from 1965 to 1988; Viking Air purchased the type certificate, then restarted ...

passenger aircraft of

Tara Air Tara Air Pvt. Ltd. is an airline headquartered in Kathmandu, Nepal. It is a subsidiary of Yeti Airlines. Tara Air was formed in 2009 using aircraft from the Yeti Airlines fleet and is based at Tribhuvan International Airport, with a secondary h ...

crashed shortly after take-off on a domestic flight from Lamidanda to

Kathmandu , pushpin_map = Nepal Bagmati Province#Nepal#Asia , coordinates = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = , subdivision_type1 = Province , subdivision_name1 = Bagmati Prov ...

, Nepal. The wreckage of the aircraft was found in Bilandu forest near the village of Shreechaur the morning after the crash. All 19 passengers and three crew aboard were killed in the crash. There was initial speculation that bad weather or the overloading of the aircraft might have caused the crash. An investigation into the crash was launched by Nepalese authorities after the accident site was located.

Accident

Five minutes after taking off from

Lamidanda Airport Lamidanda Airport is a domestic airport located in Lamidanda, Rawabesi, serving Khotang District, a district in Province No. 1 in Nepal. According to the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal, it is the gateway to the Halesi-Maratika Caves. Stat ...

at 15:08

local time Local time is the time observed in a specific locality. There is no canonical definition. Originally it was mean solar time, but since the introduction of time zones it is generally the time as determined by the time zone in effect, with daylight s ...

, the left wing of the aircraft impacted land and the DHC-6 crashed. The aircraft was reportedly scheduled to land in Kathmandu at around 15:35, 35 minutes after departure. All 19 passengers and three crew members aboard were killed in the crash. There was initial speculation that bad weather caused the crash. The chief executive of Tara Air, Vijay Shrestha, said: "It showed poor visibility at different levels of the atmosphere. Thick haze at lower levels and as thick a cloud higher up could have caused poor visibility." There was also speculation that the aircraft could have been overloaded, but Shrestha refuted these allegations. "The aircraft's maximum take-off weight is 12,500 pounds, while the Twin Otter's take-off weight that crashed killing all 22 on board was 12,280 pounds," he said. "So it was underweight by 220 pounds, the allegation is wrong."

Aircraft

The aircraft involved was a

bearing the

registration Register or registration may refer to: Arts entertainment, and media Music * Register (music), the relative "height" or range of a note, melody, part, instrument, etc. * ''Register'', a 2017 album by Travis Miller * Registration (organ), the ...

9N-AFX. It was built by

de Havilland Canada De Havilland Aircraft of Canada Limited is an aircraft manufacturer with facilities formerly based in the Downsview area of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The original home of de Havilland Canada was the home of the Canadian Air and Space Museum loca ...

in 1984 and was operated by several American airlines before it was introduced to Nepal in 2000, when

Shangri-La Air Shangri-La Air was an airline based in Nepal. It partly merged with Necon Air in 2001 and eventually ceased operations in 2008. History The airline started operations in October 1999 with oneDe Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter aircraft. Its n ...

purchased the aircraft. In 2010, just shortly before the accident, Tara Air purchased the aircraft.

Search operation

Helicopters searched for the wreckage of the aircraft on the day of the crash, but were called off during the night because of poor visibility, even though

night vision Night vision is the ability to see in low-light conditions, either naturally with scotopic vision or through a night-vision device. Night vision requires both sufficient spectral range and sufficient intensity range. Humans have poor night vi ...

equipment was installed on board. The day after the crash, the

Nepalese Army The Nepali Army ( ne, नेपाली सेना, translit=Nēpālī Sēnā), technically the Gorkhali Army ( ne, गोरखाली सेना, translit=Gōrakhālī Sēnā, label=none; see ''Gorkhas''), is the land service branch ...

located the wreckage in

Okhaldhunga Okhaldhunga is the headquarters of the Okhaldhunga District in the Sagarmatha Zone of Nepal. At the time of the 1991 Nepal census it had a population of 3761 living in 790 individual households. Background The name Okhaldhunga originates from " ...

, Nepal, at an altitude of approximately . All 22 bodies were recovered. The wreckage of the aircraft reportedly covered , and, according to a police spokesperson, had "broken up completely".

Investigation

An investigation into the crash was launched after the accident site was located. Nepal's Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation formed a group of five investigators to find the cause of the crash. The five were ordered to present a report on the accident by 90 days after the crash occurred. The

cockpit voice recorder A flight recorder is an electronic recording device placed in an aircraft for the purpose of facilitating the investigation of aviation accidents and incidents. The device may often be referred to as a "black box", an outdated name which has b ...

was recovered from the scene of the accident.

Final report

On 11 July 2011 the investigators sends their report into the accident to the Ministry of Transports of Nepal, saying that the flight was cleared to climb to 10,500 ft under Visual Fight Rules (VFR), but later the flight crew was instructed to descend to 8,500 ft for the presence of an helicopter in their opposite direction. The pilots disagreed with each other whether to continue climbing to 10,500 ft or descend to 8,500 ft. The captain which was the pilot monitoring is tending to continue the climb because based on his opinion a descent to 8,500 feet in that particular terrain was too risky, but he remained very undecided. The first officer who was the pilot flying instead was continued to press for continuing the descent. Finally, although with great reluctance, the captain decided to make the descent but during the descent the airplane entering in a cloud when the left wing impacted on a hill top. All this led investigators to stated that the main cause of the accident was the pilots imprudent decision to carry out the descent despite the risky mountainous terrain.

Other investigations

A separate investigation was also started into alleged irregularities, which, according to ''

The Himalayan Times ''The Himalayan Times'' is an English-language broadsheet newspaper published and distributed daily in Nepal Nepal (; ne, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकता� ...

'' included "carrying passengers by issuing tickets in other's name, not verifying identity while checking-in passengers and the process of immigration of the foreign nationals who lost their lives in the crash." Police arrested the general manager of a

travel agent A travel agency is a private retailer or public service that provides travel and tourism-related services to the general public on behalf of accommodation or travel suppliers to offer different kinds of travelling packages for each destinatio ...

based in Kathmandu over suspicions of

tax evasion Tax evasion is an illegal attempt to defeat the imposition of taxes by individuals, corporations, trusts, and others. Tax evasion often entails the deliberate misrepresentation of the taxpayer's affairs to the tax authorities to reduce the taxp ...

during the sale of tickets for the flight.

References

External links

Photos of 9N-AFX on Airliners.net
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tara Air Twin Otter crash, 2010 Accidents and incidents involving the de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter Aviation accidents and incidents in 2010 Aviation accidents and incidents in Nepal 2010 in Nepal History of Nepal (2008–present) December 2010 events in Asia 2010 disasters in Nepal Tara Air accidents and incidents