Necon Air

Necon Air was a Nepalese airline based in Kathmandu. The airline was Nepal's first private airline company and was established on 14 September 1992 with one Hawker Siddeley HS 748 aircraft. The airline indefinitely suspended flights in 2003 due to financial difficiculties and was delisted from the Nepal Stock Exchange in 2006.[3]

Necon Air
IATA ICAO Callsign
3Z NEC[1] NECON AIR[2]
Founded14 September 1992
Commenced operations1992
Ceased operations2003
HubsTribhuvan International Airport
Fleet size2 (at the time of closure)
Destinations10 (at the time of closure)
HeadquartersNepal

History
Necon Air ATR 42-320

The airline was Nepal's first private airline company and was established in 1992.[4] In 2001, the airline partly merged with two other local airlines, Shangri-La Air and Karnali Air. As a part of this, Necon Air took over Shangri-La Air's fleet of two Beechcraft 1900Ds.[5] Plans were announced to add two medium size Boeing or Airbus aircraft by September 2002 and extending the network to new regional destinations in South Asia and China.[5] The Executive Chairman of Karnali Air, Captain Narayan Singh Pun took on the position of Executive Chairman and Managing Director of Necon Air.[6]

Necon Air indefinitely suspended flights in 2003 due to financial difficulties. Along with debt to private commercial banks, the airline also owed NPRs 20 million to the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal for landing and ground charges and NPRs. 20 million to the Nepal Oil Corporation for fuel.[7] The airline was also in dispute with Raytheon over leasing and financial arrangements for their Beechcraft 1900 aircraft and Raytheon were seeking the grounding of the aircraft.[8]

Destinations

Necon Air regularly served the following destinations, which were cancelled either at the closure of operations or before:[4]

Country City IATA ICAO Airport Notes Refs
IndiaPatnaPATVEPTJay Prakash Narayan Airport
VaranasiVNSVEBNLal Bahadur Shastri Airport
NepalBhairahawaBWAVNBWBhairahawa Airport
BhadrapurBDPVNCGBhadrapur Airport
BiratnagarBIRVNVTBiratnagar Airport
JanakpurJKRVNJPJanakpur Airport
KathmanduKTMVNKTTribhuvan International AirportHub
NepalgunjKEPVNNGNepalgunj Airport
PokharaPKRVNPKPokhara Airport
SimaraSIFVNSISimara Airport

Fleet

At the time of closure, Necon Air operated the following aircraft:

Necon Air Fleet
AircraftIn fleetNotes
ATR 422Registered 9N-AFU and 9N-AGP.[9]

Former Fleet
Necon Air former fleet
AircraftIn fleetNotes
Hawker Siddeley HS 748[8] 1
Beechcraft 1900[8] 2
Cessna 208[7] 2

Accidents and incidents
  • 6 November 1997 - A Necon Air Avro 748-100 (9N-ACM), after a flight from Kathmandu, suffered a hydraulic system failure after landing at Pokhara Airport and ran off the runway. The pilot steered the plane back on the runway after 100m, but it ran onto the ramp and struck another Avro 748 (9N-ACW) of Nepal Airways, which was parked engineless. There were no fatalities among the 44 passengers and 4 crew.[10]
  • 18 January 1999 - Necon Air Cessna 208 Caravan I (9N-ADA) climbed steeply to 450 feet (140 m) after takeoff from Jumla Airport, but stalled and crashed and caught fire. The fire could not be extinguished because fire fighting equipment was not available at the airport. Of 10 passengers and 2 crew, 4 passengers and 1 crew member were killed. The probable cause of the accident was the pilot's failure to put the aircraft in take off configuration.[11]
  • 5 September 1999 - Necon Air Flight 128 from Pokhara Airport to Kathmandu Airport crashed when it hit a telecommunications tower.[12] All 10 passengers and 5 crew were killed.

References
  1. https://www.planespotters.net/airline/Necon-Air
  2. http://www.airlinecodes.co.uk
  3. Gurung, Indra (23 October 2006). "13 companies to be de-listed". The Himalayan Times. Retrieved 6 June 2020.
  4. Nepal Trailblazer Archived 2006-12-08 at the Wayback Machine retrieved 18 November 2006
  5. Uprety, Surendra (1 October 2001). "Operational Merge : Need of the Hour". nepalnews.com. Archived from the original on 16 February 2004.
  6. "Necon Begins Consolidation". nepalnews.com. 1 October 2001. Archived from the original on 14 November 2006.
  7. "Broken Wings". Spotlight Nepal. 5 June 2003. Archived from the original on 27 April 2006. Retrieved 1 May 2019.
  8. "Raytheon Aircraft Co may take back Necon's aeroplane". The Kathmandu Post. 22 April 2003. Archived from the original on 3 May 2006. Retrieved 1 May 2019.
  9. https://www.planespotters.net/airline/Necon-Air
  10. Aviation Safety Network retrieved 18 November 2006
  11. Aviation Safety Network retrieved 18 November 2006
  12. "Nepal suffers second fatal crash". Flightglobal. Retrieved 10 October 2017.
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