UPDATE - Dozens dead in Nepal plane crash

UPDATES WITH 39 PEOPLE DEAD, CHANGED HEADLINE, ADDS QUOTE OF POLICE SPOKESMAN

By Deepak Adhikari

KATHMANDU, Nepal (AA) - At least 39 passengers were killed after a passenger aircraft of a private Bangladeshi airline skidded off the runway and caught fire in capital Kathmandu Monday, according to police.

Police spokesman Manoj Neupane said emergency workers had so far recovered 31 bodies from the aircraft while eight others died after they were taken to hospitals in Kathmandu.

Neupane said the death toll may rise further.

The US-Bangla airlines plane had arrived in Kathmandu in the afternoon from the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka.

There were 67 passengers and four crew members aboard. According to local media reports, there were 33 Nepalis among them.

Photographs from the scene showed wreckage of the plane on a field outside the airport.

Smoke could be seen rising from the airport.

Firefighters and ambulances had rushed towards the plane to rescue trapped passengers immediately after the incident, which took place on the eastern edge of the airport after the aircraft overshot the runway.

The Kathmandu Post reported earlier that all flights out of Nepal had been cancelled following the incident.