At least 18 people have been killed after a small plane crashed and caught fire while it was taking off from Nepal’s capital Kathmandu.

The Saurya Airlines flight was carrying two crew and 17 of the company’s staff members, Dan Bahadur Karki, a Nepali police spokesman, said.

“The pilot has been rescued and is being treated. It is not possible to confirm the status of others on board right now. Many have not survived,” he added.

Eighteen Nepalis and one foreigner were aboard the flight, Gyanendra Bhul of Nepal’s Civil Aviation Authority told AFP, adding he did not have any details on the latter’s nationality.

The flight was being conducted for either technical or maintenance purposes, he added.

Images of the aftermath shared by Nepal’s military showed the plane’s fuselage split apart and burnt to a husk.

Around a dozen soldiers in camouflage were standing on top of the wreckage with the surrounding earth coated in fire retardant.

The plane crashed at around 11:15 am (05:30 GMT), the military said in a statement, adding that the army’s quick response team had been lending assistance with rescue efforts.

News site Khabarhub reported that the aircraft had caught fire after skidding on the runway.

The plane was scheduled to fly on Nepal’s busiest air route between Kathmandu and Pokhara, an important tourism hub in the Himalayan republic.

Saurya Airlines exclusively flies Bombardier CRJ 200 jets, according to its website.

Nepal has a woeful track record on aviation safety and the Himalayan republic has seen a spate of deadly light plane and helicopter crashes over the decades.

The country’s air industry has boomed in recent years, carrying goods and people between hard-to-reach areas as well as foreign trekkers and climbers. But insufficient staff training and maintenance compounded by the mountainous republic’s treacherous geography has led to several incidents.

The European Union has banned all Nepali carriers from its airspace over safety concerns.

The Himalayan country has some of the world’s trickiest runways to land on, flanked by snow-capped peaks with approaches that pose a challenge even for accomplished pilots.

The weather can also change quickly in the mountains, creating treacherous flying conditions.

Nepal’s last major commercial flight accident was in January 2023, when a Yeti Airlines service crashed while landing at Pokhara, killing all 72 aboard.

That accident was Nepal’s deadliest since 1992 when all 167 people aboard a Pakistan International Airlines plane died when it crashed on approach to Kathmandu airport.

Earlier that year a Thai Airways aircraft had crashed near the same airport, killing 113 people.