Tribhuvan International Airport opens

Kathmandu / July 12: All domestic and international flights were cancelled or diverted following the closure of Nepal’s only international airport for eight hours on Friday after a plane skidded off the runway amid a heavy monsoon downpour.

A Yeti Airlines aircraft from Nepalgunj to Kathmandu careened 20 metres off the runway and onto the grass while landing from the Koteshwor side on Friday morning. All 72 people, including two minors and four crew members on board the aircraft, safely disembarked, said Bhim Raj Rai, media manager at Yeti Airlines.

Although the Tribhuvan International Airport said in a statement that three passengers had sustained minor injuries during the incident and were taken to Kathmandu Medical College, a medical officer at the hospital told the Post that the three individuals had flown to Kathmandu for treatment and were not injured in Friday’s incident.

As the aircraft remained lodged on Tribhuvan International Airport’s only runway, the airport was closed down for the day at 11:06 am. As heavy rains battered the country, the airport authorities struggled to tow the turboprop. The plane was finally removed at around 6.45pm and the airport came back online at 7pm.

In April last year, the airport was closed for more than 12 hours after a Kuala Lumpur-bound Malindo Air flight, with 139 people on board, suffered a “runway excursion”–when an aircraft veers off the runway–after an aborted takeoff.

Again, in September last year, a Yeti Airlines Jetstream 41 aircraft skidded off the runway, halting all domestic and international flights at the airport for 12 hours.