The plane, carrying two crew members and 17 technicians, was going for regular maintenance to Nepal’s new Pokhara airport, which opened last January and is equipped with aircraft maintenance hangars, they said.

"Only the captain was rescued alive and is receiving treatment at a hospital," said Tej Bahadur Poudyal, the spokesman for Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport.

Television visuals showed fire fighters trying to put out the blaze and thick black smoke rising into the sky. They also showed the plane flying a little above the runway and then tilting before it crashed.

Other visuals showed rescue workers rummaging through the charred remains of the plane, strewn in lush green fields. Bodies were carried to ambulances on stretchers as local residents looked on, the television showed.

The airport was closed temporarily, officials said.

A Saurya Airlines official said the plane was a 50-seater CRJ200 aircraft.