KATMANDU, NEPAL: Yet another air crash can be added to the list of tragedy and natural disasters that has hard hit Asian cities this summer. Pakistan had its share of death and distortion when earlier this month thousands were left homeless and hundreds died when torrential flood waters roared thru the lowlands between India and Pakistan’s Punjab area.
A Pakistan jet filled with Europeans including mountain climbers and missionaries plowed into a pine-covered hillside, and rescuers searching the burning wreckage reported no survivors among the 167 aboard.
The pilot had given no indication anything was wrong before contact was lost with the plane, and the weather was normal, officials said.
Airline sources in Pakistan said the plane may have been flying too low as it approached this city ringed by Himalayan mountains thousands of feet high.
The airline has had a poor safety and service record in recent for a few chunks of scattered wreckage, the fuselage was mainly in one piece. The plane’s tail was in the air and its nose buried in the ground.
The accident occurred at the start of Nepal’s tourist season, when dozens of mountain-climbing teams fly into this picturesque land to climb the world’s highest peaks.
Article extracted from this publication >> October 9, 1992
