Kathmandu, May 30: In Nepal, hopes were fading on Monday of finding survivors among the 22 people aboard a small plane that crashed into the Himalayan mountainside the previous day, officials said, with only two people left to consider.

Two Germans, four Indians and 16 Nepalese were on board the De Havilland Canada DHC-6-300 Twin Otter plane which crashed 15 minutes after taking off from the tourist town of Pokhara, 125 km (80 miles) east west of Kathmandu on Sunday morning.

“There is very little chance of finding survivors,” said Deo Chandra Lal Karna, spokesman for the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal.

Nepalese soldiers and rescue workers had recovered 20 bodies from the wreckage, strewn down a steep slope at an altitude of around 14,500ft.

The difficult terrain and bad weather had hampered the search teams. An image published in Nepalese media showed uniformed rescuers pulling a body from the wreckage and using ropes to carry it on a stretcher up a steep, grassy ridge.

“There is a very thick cloud in the area,” Netra Prasad Sharma, the highest-ranking official in Mustang district, where the accident happened, told Reuters by phone. “The search for bodies continues.

In Kathmandu, relatives of the victims waited for the bodies to be brought back from the crash site, and the aviation authority said in a tweet that official identification of the victims had yet to take place.

“I’m waiting for my son’s body,” Maniram Pokhrel told Reuters, his voice muffled. His son Utsav Pokhrel, 25, was the co-pilot. 

Operated by private company Tara Air, the plane crashed in cloudy weather on Sunday morning and the wreckage was not spotted until Monday morning by the Nepalese military.-Agencies