Nepal flood death toll rises to 579, nearly 2,000 still missing: disaster authority

Nepal’s disaster authority on Friday put the number of people missing after devastating floods at 1,924, two days after the disaster killed at least 579 people in the country.

The number of missing includes 517 foreigners, as well as 933 workers on hydropower projects on the rivers where a wall of water powered down on Wednesday morning, according to the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority.

Rescue teams on Friday used heavy machinery to dig through mud and debris in Nepalese towns devastated by a flash flood two days ago, as hopes of finding survivors faded and officials worked to reduce the risk of further catastrophic flooding.

The flood ripped through villages and valleys, destroying power stations, roads and bridges along a route that links Kathmandu with Lhasa in Tibet and is popular with trekkers and pilgrims.

Authorities in Nepal used helicopters to search for survivors and drop emergency supplies to thousands cut off in towns and valleys while emergency services, some using sniffer dogs, recovered dozens of bodies swept down into the plains.

Around 320 Indian nationals are still missing in the aftermath of the devastating flash flood, a spokesperson for India’s foreign ministry said, adding that at least 400 were stranded but safe on the Chinese side, while another 96 had crossed into Nepal by land.

Dibga Tamang was among the last people rescued from the hard-hit town of Rasuwa on Thursday, airlifted along with three others to an army camp in Nuwakot.

“All of our people have gone. They are dead,” Tamang said. “I have no one left waiting for me. Everything and everyone is gone. The end.”

The sheer amount of water and debris stirred up now risks triggering a further disaster.

Nepal’s disaster management authority warned that a lake formed by debris blocking the Bhotekoshi River was rising and at risk of bursting, while on the other side of the border China said that some three million cubic metres of water, the equivalent of about 1,200 Olympic-sized swimming pools, was expected to flow into an already dammed lake over the next three days.

There is a high risk the lake could breach, with peak flow expected around September 1, Chinese state media said, citing the water resources ministry.

Chinese authorities have mobilised an eight-member engineering team to conduct aerial surveys and 3D modelling of the barrier lake, but accessing it was challenging.

“After the glacier collapse created the lake, many isolated cliffs and steep cliffs appeared along it,” one of the engineers, Chen Hanxiao, told CCTV.

Chen said the general approach to reducing the lake’s threat is to excavate a drainage channel at a lower point of the dam, but the width and depth of that channel needed calculations based on how fast the water will flow and how quickly the lake will fill.

Their next tasks were to monitor the lake and collect data from the lake floor, as well as weather monitoring in the coming days.

Nepali Army working to rescue 100 trapped in hydropower tunnel

Nepali Army teams searched for more than 100 people trapped inside a hydropower tunnel, as India offered to send a specialised rescue team.

India has extensive experience with difficult Himalayan tunnel rescues, including specialised teams of “rat-hole” miners. However, the uncertainty was agonising for families waiting for news.

“I have not heard from him since I spoke to him at 7am that day. We have not had any news about them either, if they are being rescued or not,” Sita Adhikari, whose husband was trapped in the hydropower tunnel, told reporters.

“We will have hope as long as we have our breath… We need them to be rescued as soon as possible,” she said.

“Nobody’s ever seen anything quite like that, where very powerful, strong, well-built buildings were wiped out like they were toothpicks. It’s a terrible thing. We are sending aid and we’ve spoken to the leadership and we let them know anything they want, they’ll have.”

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif also offered “whatever possible assistance was required” in a phone call with his Nepali counterpart, Balendra Shah, according to a statement by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO).

He conveyed to Shah that Pakistan was dispatching emergency relief assistance to Nepal in order to help with the relief efforts, the statement said, as well as expressing condolences and “complete solidarity” with the Nepali leadership and people.

Ganesh Aryal, the administrator of Chitwan district, said authorities had recovered 103 bodies from the river system in his district, which is about 100 kilometres away in the plains from the worst-hit region of Trishuli.

With local hospitals unable to accommodate all the bodies, district authorities were setting up tents and making arrangements for families to claim their dead relatives, he said.

Nepal’s Prime Minister Balendra Shah, who visited flood-hit Nuwakot on Thursday, said the situation was still difficult.

“All the state agencies are operating at full capacity. Our first priority now is to save the life of each citizen, search and rescue of the missing, treat the injured and provide immediate relief to the affected families,” he said.

The disaster is a major challenge for Shah’s five-month-old government but officials said the country had systems and officials who have experience in handling such tragedies, including the 2015 earthquake that killed nearly 9,000 people.

Additional input from AFP