Two young Indian girls were lucky to survive the Nepalese airliner crash today near high-altitude Jomsom airport in northern Nepal, being among the six
who were rescued alive from the debris of the ill-fated plane. The girls aged 6 and 9 were among three Indian survivors of the crash in which the Dronier aircraft got buried after hitting a mountain peak straddling the airport. "The girls are conscious and out of danger," Indian Embassy spokesperson Apoorva Srivastav said. 

The third survivor, she said, was a 45-year-old man. It was not clear whether the parents of the young girls survived. The girls and the man were part of a group of Indian pilgrims apparently from the South who were overtaken by ill
fate on their way to a pilgrimage to the holy shrine of Muktinath.

"We are in touch with few of the relatives of the families," she said, adding that the control room number has been circulated and people have been contacting us. Sixteen people, most of them Indians, died in the crash.