Nepalese airline conducts maiden flight to Everest gateway

Kathmandu, Oct 7 (IANS) A Nepalese airline has conducted a maiden flight to the Tenzing Hillary Airport at Lukla, the gateway to Mount Everest, an official said on Sunday.

After conducting test flights to different remote airports including Lukla last week, flag carrier Nepal Airlines Corp (NAC) used 17-seater planes to fly to the Hillary Airport, located at an elevation of 2,800 metres in Solukhumbu district, reports Xinhua news agency.

Although the NAC has four Y-12e planes in its domestic fleet, it had not conducted flights to remote mountainous areas, citing technical issues as well as pilot shortage.

"The flight to Lukla is the first step towards conducting the flights to the country's remote regions with Chinese made planes," NAC spokesman Ashok Sigdel said. "We conducted one regular flight and one chartered flight with Y-12e planes."

It is the first time the NAC conducted a scheduled flight to Lukla after a gap of two years.

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