KATHMANDU: A US-Bangla Bombardier Q400 aircraft erupted into flames before slamming into an empty field meters beyond the runway at the Tribhuvan International Airport in Nepal's capital Kathmandu on Monday afternoon. The crash left at least 50 of the 71 people onboard dead.

The plane overshot its landing and swerved repeatedly before it crashed and burst into flames uncoiling huge, dark columns of smoke from the site of the accident.

The jet was carrying 67 passengers: 32 from Bangladesh, 33 from Nepal and one each from China and the Maldives, and four crewmembers onboard.

According to an airport official, the pilot of US-Bangla Airlines flight BS211 had approached airport's runway from the wrong direction. He did not follow the landing instructions from the traffic control tower, the official said.

"The airplane was not properly aligned with the runway. The tower repeatedly asked if the pilot was OK and the reply was 'yes,'" Raj Kumar Chetri, the airport's general manager, told the Associated Press.

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Also, a recording of the conversations between the pilot and air traffic controllers indicated confusion over which direction the plane should land.

In the recording, posted by the air traffic monitoring website liveatc.net, the conversation veers repeatedly about whether the pilot should land on the airport's single runway from the south or the north.

Just before landing the pilot asks "Are we cleared to land?"

Moments later, the controller comes back on, using a tone rarely heard in such conversations — perhaps even panic — and tells the pilot: "I say again, turn!"

Seconds later, the controller orders firetrucks onto the runway.

Furthermore, an audio recording was posted on YouTube on Monday night related to flight BS211. US-Bangla spokesman Kamrul Islam reportedly said that the recording seemed to be the last conversation between the pilot and the air traffic control tower.



"It was flying so low I thought it was going to run into the mountains," said an eyewitness, who watched the crash from the terrace of her home office, told the AP. "All of a sudden there was a blast and then another blast."

One Nitin Keyal, who was at the airport to board a domestic flight, said: "It was flying very low". "Everyone just froze looking at it. You could tell it wasn't a normal landing." He saw the aircraft breaking apart and bursting into flames.

"For a few minutes, no one could believe what was happening. It was just terrible," he said.