Search for 1,000 missing after deadly Nepal-Tibet floods

Rescue teams rushed Thursday to find more than 1,000 people missing on the Nepal-Tibet border in flash floods and landslides that killed at least 165 and swept away entire villages.

A terrifying clip of surveillance video from the Chinese side of the frontier shows a massive wall of mud and debris crashing over a building several stories high on Wednesday morning, engulfing it as dozens of people ran for their lives below. The surge swept away buses and cars like they were toys.

Many of the missing are foreign tourists, officials said of the disaster, which the US Geological Survey believe was caused by a glacial collapse that sent a flow of debris engulfing areas along the way.

The tsunami-like rumble of water and mud struck villages and towns on the path of two rivers — Bhote Koshi and Trishuli, with Nepali police saying they had recovered 162 bodies.

Across the border, Chinese state media said the “mudslide disaster” at the Gyirong Port in Tibet claimed three lives while 558 people, including 260 foreigners, were still missing.

Raju Bhadel, 56, a businessman in Nepal’s Nuwakot district, recounted receiving a call from his brother-in-law in distress.

“They were crying and said their entire house had been swept away. Three family members were rescued, but his brother is still missing,” he said.

Also at Nuwakot, teacher Manok Mishra witnessed “nine trucks being swept away by the floods including people”.

‘Inland tsunami’

Rescuers waded through mud and sludge to look for survivors after floodwaters buried the lower floors of multi-storey buildings.

Some 468 tourists — 393 of them foreigners — were unaccounted for a day after the disaster struck, according to Nepal’s tourism ministry.

Nepal did not provide a figure for residents in affected areas who are still missing.

On China’s end, rescuers were seeking 558 missing, including 260 foreign nationals, according to local officials quoted by state broadcaster CCTV.

The foreigners out of contact included Indians, and others from Australia, Britain, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Portugal, South Africa, South Korea and the United States, Nepal’s tourism board said.

The rush of mud and debris was “like an inland tsunami, travelling nearly 170 kilometres down the Bhote Koshi valley into Central Nepal”, said environmental historian Ruth Gamble of La Trobe University.

“It is a popular route for international tourists travelling from Kathmandu to Lhasa,” she added.

“Entire villages and market areas have been wiped out,” said David Fisher, the Nepal head of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).

It said it was dispatching emergency supplies including blankets, first aid kits, stretchers and body bags.

Tibet government officials mobilised nearly 800 emergency workers and 150 vehicles as well as sniffer dogs and speed boats to help the rescue efforts, China’s state-run news agency Xinhua said.

Glacial collapse

The cause of the disaster was not immediately clear in the hours after it occurred early Wednesday, but the US Geological Survey said it was a glacial collapse that caused seismic activity and the “catastrophic” downstream impacts in Nepal and Tibet.

“This event was initially reported as a magnitude 4.4 earthquake,” it said.

“Additional analysis of nearby seismic stations, long period seismic waves, and satellite imagery led to the determination that the seismic event was instead a glacial collapse and debris flow, and that no earthquake had occurred.”

Climate change is causing glaciers to melt worldwide, increasing the risks of glacial lake floods and glacial collapses.

Experts cautioned that a lingering blockage in a river could produce an additional flood.

Images shared by Nepali police showed floodwater surging through a river, sweeping away houses in its path, while AFP images depicted the top floor of a house sticking out from muddy soil.

Rasuwa, in the north of Nepal, was the first district to be affected. But deaths have been reported from seven Nepali districts in total as the flood waters raged downstream, all the way to Chitwan in the south, on the border with India.

Many trekking companies were not running tours during the monsoon season, but there remains significant numbers of travellers including pilgrims in the region.

Among sites hit by the flood was Syabrubesi, the gateway to the popular trekking areas, as well as by pilgrims travelling to the base of the Mount Kailash, a holy site for Buddhists and Hindus.

The Nepali Army was carrying out flights and had rescued scores of people, while others living near the river in danger zones had been told to relocate.

China’s leader Xi Jinping said that “the most urgent task is doing everything possible to search for and rescue the missing people”, according to CCTV.

Traffic authorities in Tibet’s Shigatse said roads in the area were “at risk of mudslides and unsafe for passage”.

Qianggong Zhang, head of climate and environmental risks at the Kathmandu-based International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD), warned of the potential for a second flood.

“With a blockage still lodged upstream on the Nepal-China border river, authorities warn a second flood may occur,” he told AFP.

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Dateline:

Nuwakot, Nepal

Type of Story: News Service

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