The aviation history of Nepal started in early 1950's.Initially, neighboring Indian aircraft used to land on a mere cow grazing place called Gaucharan in Kathmandu. There are tales that a pilot waiting to land there had to buzz the airfield several times to shoo the cows off it before landing. Until 1951, only a few foreigners had penetrated into Nepal. They were mainly British officers of the Gurkha troops, a few stray scholars and friends of the Royal family. Later on, Indian air companies started their operation for business purposes, and connected Nepal with Indian cities. After the establishment of the national flag carrier, the RNA, the route expansion of civil aviation made extensive progress domestically and internationally. The civil aviation service started in Nepal in 1953 with three old American -made DC-3 Dakotas belonging to an Indian company. After five years, Nepal established her own registered airline, Royal Nepal Airlines Corporation in July 1958 with one DC-3. There were only 96 personnel then. At the beginning,its service was limited to Indian cities like Patna, Calcutta and Delhi in the International Sector and to Simara, Pokhara and Biratnagar in the Domestic Sector. The facilities provided at that time were limited. Royal Nepal took over an international schedule in 1960. Starting with a fleet of Douglas DC-3's, the airline quickly moved on to the turboprop Fokker F-27. The commissioning of the remarkable Twin Otter and Pilatus Porter aircraft into the Royal Nepal Airlines fleet in 1970s brought about a quick and easy way of accessing many of the remote regions of the kingdom.
