All 18 bodies recovered from Nepal plane crash site

, Feb 17: Government officials and security personnel have begun preparations to airlift all 18 bodies retrieved from the

site on Sunday in the remote hilly region of

, police personnel said.

Sources at Civil Aviation Authority in Nepal (CAAN), Nepal's aviation regulator, and Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC), the state-owned aviation service provider, confirmed to Xinhua that all passengers and crew on board the aircraft have been found dead.

Their bodies were scattered at the site where the wreckage of the plane was located Monday morning. The dead included three crew members.

"The identity of seven passengers has been ascertained," Bimalesh Karna, chief of the Rescue Coordination Center at Nepal's Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu told Xinhua.

According to him, those who have been identified so far are the Nepal Army's Deepak Shrestha, Nepali Congress's Jumla president Manav Sejuwal, Barsha Hamal, Sahish Hamal, Dibesh Shahi, air hostess Muna Maharjan, and Rejendra Chaulagain.

"As most of the bodies have been burnt down and scattered, they cannot be identified," Karna said, adding the bodies will be brought to Kathmandu's Teaching Hospital for autopsy, the only way to know about the actual reason of death and to ascertain the identities of the deceased.

Officials said the bodies will be brought to Nepal's capital by Monday evening.

Government officials were able to figure out the crash site of the NAC Twin Otter only on Monday morning, some 20 hours after the plane went missing on Sunday afternoon.

IANS