SURVIVORS of a plane crash in Nepal have said it is a miracle they are still alive after the accident which killed 49 of the 71 people onboard.
Shorna Huggain, of Bangladesh, was a passenger on the US-Bangla Airlines flight when it crashed on Monday while landing at Kathmandu’s airport.
“I thought I was going to die because I inhaled a lot of smoke,” she said from her hospital bed, recalling how she was pinned in her seat after the crash.
“Finally, my husband was able to pull me out of the plane, and moments later it burst into flames,” she said. “My husband saved my life.”
Her brother-in-law died in the crash.
Nepalese travel entrepreneur Keshav Pandey, believes he was ejected from the plane when it broke on impact. He said: “I have not heard of many people surviving a plane crash, but it is a miracle that I am alive.”
“I guess I lived because the plane crashed on open grounds.”
Both survivors recalled the flight being mostly smooth all the way from Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, to Kathmandu, Nepal’s capital.
But they said that before the crash, the aircraft violently shook, tilting toward the left and hitting the ground with a huge crash.
Among the 22 survivors, two have gone home, while the others are treated at hospitals in Kathmandu.
Nepalese investigators have begun an inquiry into the crash, with Kathmandu officials and the airline blaming each other for the accident.
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