The bodies of all the six passengers aboard the helicopter that crashed on Tuesday in Nepal's Mount Everest have been recovered. Along with this, they have also been identified. Among these, the pilot was Nepali and 5 civilians were Mexican. They were members of the same family.
Kathmandu: A helicopter carrying Mexican tourists crashed near Mount Everest in Nepal on Tuesday, killing all six people on board. Officials have confirmed the deaths of all five Mexican nationals.
Doctor Dr. Abril Cifuentes Gonzalez and 4 other members of his family also died in this. The helicopter crashed in the Lamajura area and all the bodies have been recovered, said Basant Bhattarai, the area’s chief government administrator. The Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal said in a statement that the five tourists were Mexican nationals and the pilot was Nepalese.
The Mexicans included two men and three women. Mexico’s ambassador to India, Federico Salas, told N+ of Mexico’s Televisa network that the five Mexican victims were part of a family.
Mexico’s National Cancer Institute said via Twitter that one of those killed was Dr. Abril Cifuentes González, an internal medicine specialist there.
A week ago, Sifuentes posted a photo of himself standing in front of India’s Taj Mahal on Instagram. Two rescue helicopters were used to take the bodies out of the crash site and then to the capital Kathmandu. Doctors were expected to conduct autopsies before handing over the bodies to relatives or, in the case of foreigners, to embassy officials.
The aircraft was returning to Kathmandu on Tuesday morning after taking tourists on a tour of the world’s highest peak. It is not clear what was the cause of the accident. Airport official Sagar Kadel said the planned flight path of the helicopter had to be changed due to weather conditions.
Flight delays and diversions are common during the monsoon season and heavy rains. The tourism and mountaineering season ends in May with the start of the rainy season and tourist flights are less common at this time of year as visibility is low and weather conditions become unpredictable.
