Hours after a Pokhara-bound aircraft of Saurya Airlines crashed at Tribhuvan International Airport, family members, kin and friends gathered at the Maharajgunj premises of Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital (TUTH), where the bodies were taken for postmortem.

The family members and other relatives there were visibly distressed to see the condition of the bodies. But doctors assigned to conduct the autopsies said the process would take days to complete, including the preparation of reports and handover of the bodies to the families after identification.

Of the 19 people on board the plane, only the pilot Manish Ratna Shakya survived. However, his condition is stable, according to the Kathmandu Model College, Sinamangal, where Shakya is being treated.

Most of the deceased were technical staff members who were flying to Pokhara for the C-check of the aeroplane. The C-check or extensive maintenance process takes one to two weeks, say aircraft technicians.

Those who lost their dear ones were devastated, and hearing their anguished accounts felt painful.

In the crash, three members of a family were killed.

Manuraj Sharma, a technician with the airlines, his wife Priza Khatiwada and their four-year old son Adhiraj Sharma, died in the incident.

Priza worked as an assistant computer operator at the Ministry of Energy, Water Resources, and Irrigation, while Manuraj was a technician at Saurya Airlines.

The bodies of those who were killed in the crash are being kept at the TUTH and their postmortem report will be submitted after three days, according to a police officer the Post met on the hospital premises.

“Postmortem reports will be given to the family members after three days. Only then will the bodies be handed over,” the police officer, who is not authorised to speak to the media, told the Post on the condition of anonymity.

“Some bodies are recognisable, some not,” the police officer added.

The TUTH administration has assigned 25 doctors for the postmortem of the 18 people who died in the crash. “We will try to complete the postmortem as soon as possible,” said Gopal Prasad Chaudhary, head of the forensic department of the TUTH Maharajgunj.

The hospital was planning to perform the autopsy on four bodies to start with. According to him, it takes around four hours to complete the postmortem of one body.

“However it depends on the degree of burn,” he added. Chaudhary also said that it may take more time if they needed to go for a DNA test to ascertain identity.

The hospital administration is considering handing over the bodies to the families after ‘cosmetic surgery’ since some of them have been burnt beyond recognition.

Meanwhile, most family members the Post met at the TUTH questioned the airlines and civil aviation authority for permitting the flight despite knowing that the plane had technical problems.

Dirga Bahadur Khadka, a grand uncle of co-pilot Sushant Katwal, the 30-year-old resident of Radhe Radhe in Bhaktapur who was killed in the crash, questioned the Airlines company and the civil aviation authority.

“We suspect that the company put pressure on the pilots into flying the plane,” Khadka told the Post. “Otherwise, no one would like to fly a plane with technical problems.”

“A question also arises about the civil aviation authority, the aviation sector regulator,” he further said. “How could it allow planes with technical problems to fly?”

Similarly, Gyanendra Khadgi, who lost his brother-in-law Purna Ratna Shahi, 66, a technician of Saurya Airlines, echoed Khadka.

“This is complete negligence on the part of civil aviation to allow the flight of a plane with a technical issue,” he told the Post.

However, this is not only the opinion of the deceased families.

Suresh Bindukar, 45, a senior technician of Altitude Airlines, also lost his father, Shyam Bindukar, 81, who was a senior technician of Saurya Airlines.

“Until aircraft engineers give the green signal for the plane to take off, no plane can fly,” Suresh told the Post. “People are raising questions as they are now in grief, which is understandable, but I have also lost my father and I am here sympathising with my 78-year-old mother.”

Among those present on the hospital premises were also people who had not shared the details of the accident to their parents.

Co-pilot Sushant Katwal’s grandfather is around 80-years-old, whereas his father Om Katwal is 55. “We haven’t shared the information of Sushant’s death with grandfather,” Khadka, Sushant’s grand uncle, told the Post. “We fear his grandfather might collapse after knowing the details.”

According to Nepal’s civil aviation body, it is the 105th plane crash in Nepali skies since the first disaster in August 1955.