Nepal's only international airport has been closed after a Turkish Airlines plane skidded off the runway early Wednesday morning.
Airport officials say flight service might resume by evening but they are yet to find the way to pull the crashed aircraft off the runway.
An airbus 330 plane carrying 224 passengers went off the runway while crash-landing at Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA), Kathmandu at around 7:45 a.m. All passengers are safe. They were evacuated through emergency exit doors.
The plane, which skidded onto grassland after missing the runway, is still stuck there. It is not clear what caused the crash. The TIA officials say technical failure and bad weather might have caused it. The TIA runway was covered with fog early morning.
Civil Aviation Authority Nepal (CAAN) authorities are now busy discussing ways to remove the crashed plane, clearing the runway for other international planes to land and take off.
After the crash, international airlines have either cancelled or delayed their flights to and from Kathmandu. Hundreds of passengers are seen outside the TIA, waiting for information about their delayed flights. Some airlines have asked passengers to contact their travel agencies by pasting notice outside the TIA terminal.
The airport was initially closed till 12 p.m. But, only domestic flights were allowed after 12 p.m. The TIA administration has published another notice, saying the airport will be closed until 5 p.m.
The CAAN lacks equipment to pull the plane off the grassland, without which disrupted international flight service is unlikely to resume.
"We do not own equipment required to remove such a big aircraft because they are expensive," a CAAN official told Nepali Times.