A pilot is the lone survivor after a plane slipped off the runway while taking off in Nepal.

Apart from the pilot, all 18 of those on board the domestic flight from Kathmandu had died, police official Basanta Rajauri said.

The pilot had injuries to his eyes but his life was not in any danger, a doctor at Kathmandu Medical College Hospital said.

The Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal said the Saurya Airlines domestic plane, which was scheduled to head to the resort town of Pokhara, took off at 11.11am on Wednesday from Kathmandu airport. It turned right but crashed moments later in the eastern section of the airport.

It is monsoon rain season in Kathmandu but was not raining at the time of the crash.

However, visibility was low across the capital.

The Kathmandu airport, the main airport serving Nepal, is inside a valley surrounded by mountains on most sides. It is considered a challenging airport for pilots, and bigger planes have to come through an opening on the mountain to land.

The bodies have been taken to the TU Teaching Hospital in Kathmandu for autopsy.

The airline manifest showed there were two pilots and 17 passengers on board.

The crew and 16 passengers were Nepali nationals. The other passenger was identified as a Yemeni national.

Tribhuvan International Airport, the main airport in Nepal for international and domestic flights, has been closed as emergency crew and investigators began their work.

Saurya Airlines operates the Bombardier CRJ 200 on domestic routes.

In 2019, a Bangladeshi airliner crashed at Tribhuvan airport, killing 51 people while 20 on board survived.

An investigation confirmed the plane was misaligned with the runway and its pilot was disoriented and tried to land in “sheer desperation” when the plane crashed.

In 2015, a Turkish Airlines jet landing in dense fog skidded off a slippery runway at the airport.

The plane was carrying 238 people but there were no serious injuries.