Families search independently for missing as Nepal flood rescue effort enters second week

One week after flash floods devastated riverside communities along the Nepal-Tibet border on August 26, rescuers are continuing to search for survivors while families of missing foreign nationals have begun travelling independently to Kathmandu seeking information. More than 1,000 people have been confirmed dead and some 4,000 remain missing, according to multiple sources, with 21,000 Nepali security forces and rescuers involved in a sprawling rescue and humanitarian operation.

The disaster was triggered when part of a glacier approximately 3,000 feet wide broke off a mountain and fell roughly 4,000 feet into a river valley, according to NPR, sending a torrent of debris, mud and ice through riverside settlements. Nepal's Prime Minister Balendra Shah, addressing parliament, said experts had identified the event as one of the largest disasters in the region, caused by an avalanche of snow and rock in the high Himalayas.

Nepali police figures cited by the Times of India put the death toll at 1,127 with 3,916 people still out of contact and 11,993 rescued. A total of 292 injured people were admitted to hospitals, of whom 182 have been discharged. The BBC reported that more than 1,000 people have been killed, with 3,900 still missing, figures consistent with the other sources.

A significant portion of the rescue effort has focused on approximately a dozen hydropower plants buried under mud along the Trishuli River, where workers are believed to have sheltered in underground tunnels. Tunnelling expert Arnold Dix, who is overseeing part of the rescue at a plant called Trishuli 3A, told NPR the post-flood landscape was 'like a bomb's gone off,' with the ground risen between 30 and 50 feet in some areas, burying power stations entirely. Rescuers have used advanced mapping techniques to locate tunnel entrances and, according to Dix, called in the army to use explosives to clear large boulders blocking access. Nepal's Prime Minister Shah said nearly 300 people had been rescued from hydropower projects, with Reuters reporting most were rescued over the weekend from the Upper Trishuli-1 plant.

The floods caused extensive infrastructure damage. According to the Times of India, eight operating hydropower projects with a combined capacity of 281 MW and four under construction with 388 MW capacity were damaged, disrupting 431.1 MW of generation. Major road sections, 48 suspension bridges and 31 motorable bridges were also destroyed or heavily damaged.

Among those missing are 38 Australians, according to ABC News Australia. Three of them — Bhavinkumar Raval, Karan Bhardwaj and Arpan Kothari — were travelling with tour operator Kailash Journeys in a group of 26 foreign travellers heading to the Kailash Mansarovar pilgrimage. The tour company's last contact with the group was at 7:30am in Timure on the morning of the disaster, according to ABC News. Timure is approximately a 25-minute walk from the Gyirong immigration checkpoint, which was struck by flooding roughly an hour later.

Bhavinkumar Raval's wife, Aarti Raval, based in Brisbane, has been tracking photographs, videos, survivor accounts, immigration records and social media posts to reconstruct her husband's last known location, concluding he may be in a mud area near the immigration office along the Pasang Lhamu Highway, according to ABC News. She said she has passed her research to Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and to Nepal Police but expressed frustration at the response, saying she was 'not feeling that I have been supported by them at all.' Her brother Jony Raval travelled from Gujarat, India, to Kathmandu to search in person, saying he came 'to fulfil a promise to my sister' and would not leave without finding her husband.

Other relatives of missing Australians have also arrived in Kathmandu, including the husbands of Reshma Patel and Sumi Adhikari and relatives of the Iyer family, according to ABC News. Sumi Adhikari's husband, Rava Pandey, said he had 'accepted the reality of what has happened' and would begin final rituals on Thursday. ABC News reported that Bhavinkumar Raval, Karan Bhardwaj and Arpan Kothari are not among the six Australians identified as unaccounted for on the Chinese side of the border. The Australian government said its officials in Beijing and Canberra were 'engaging with Chinese authorities' and had 'consistently sought further and updated information on what the Chinese authorities know of any Australians involved.'

In Britain, the BBC reported that 36 British nationals were unaccounted for as of Tuesday, up from a previous figure of 33, according to Under-Secretary of State Lord Wood of Anfield speaking in the House of Lords. A British aid worker, Alastair Chambers of Gloucester, said he was incorrectly reported as a rescued survivor after Nepali police assumed he had been rescued when he returned to Kathmandu on a humanitarian helicopter. Chambers, aged 45, said he had been helping distribute sleeping bags, water purification tools, food and essentials to communities cut off by collapsed bridges. He said the journey to the affected area, normally one and a half hours from Kathmandu, took eight or nine hours due to flood damage.

UK Minister for the Indo-Pacific Baroness Winterton was scheduled to visit Kathmandu from Wednesday to Thursday to discuss support for recovery efforts and meet Nepali and UN officials, embassy staff and members of the UK's rapid deployment team. Foreign Office minister Stephen Doughty was also set to meet members of the British-Nepali community in London on Wednesday, according to the BBC.

Questions have been raised about the government's initial response. A survivor, Janak Thapaliya, who escaped by climbing onto a floating water tanker, told NPR his friends 'could have survived, but they did not get the chance,' with his anger reflecting wider sentiment that the government had been slow to accept foreign assistance. Nepal's finance minister, Swarnim Wagle, said assistance had been accepted 'according to the needs on the ground.' Ashish Pradhan, senior adviser at the International Crisis Group, told NPR the government's 'initial hesitation to reach out to outside help was something that they course-corrected on' and said officials were 'doing the best that they can.' By Tuesday, two teams from India and one from China specialising in tunnel rescue had arrived, and a Korean team was also on its way, according to the Nepali foreign affairs spokesperson.

Nepal's Prime Minister Shah used his parliamentary address to call on the international community to share responsibility for the consequences of climate change, stating: 'Climate change is a product of the whole world's contribution; mitigating and managing its effects is the shared responsibility of the global community.' He described the disaster as a signal that risks in the Himalayan region are increasing alongside climate change.

Where sources differ

• The number of British nationals unaccounted for differs slightly between sources: the BBC reports 36 as of Tuesday, up from 33, while no other source specifies this figure.
• The total number of missing people varies slightly across sources: the Times of India cites 3,916 still out of contact per Nepali Police figures; NPR cites 'some 4,000 missing' per a Wednesday briefing; the BBC similarly references 3,900 still missing. No source explains the discrepancy.

• Whether any of the approximately 38 missing Australians have been confirmed dead or rescued has not been established by the sources.
• The precise location of Bhavinkumar Raval, Karan Bhardwaj and Arpan Kothari at the time of the flood has not been confirmed by any official source.
• China's official response to requests for information about missing foreign nationals — beyond the Australian government's statement that it is engaging Chinese authorities — is not detailed in any source.
• The total number of foreign nationals from all countries who remain missing is not specified across the sources.
• The outcome of Jony Raval's meetings with Kailash Journeys, Nepal immigration authorities or the Chinese embassy is not reported.
• The number of workers still believed trapped in hydropower tunnels and how many tunnels have been successfully accessed is not fully established.
• The Foreign Office did not respond to the BBC's request for comment regarding the number of missing British nationals.
• The sources do not clarify the discrepancy between the various figures given for total missing persons (3,916 vs approximately 4,000 vs 3,900).
• No independent verification of Aarti Raval's reconstruction of her husband's last location is reported.
• The Nepali government's Bikram Timilsina's defence of the search-and-rescue response, referenced in ABC News, is not fully quoted due to the source being truncated.

1. ABC News Australia — original — by Meghna Bali and Bhat Burhan
2. The Times of India — by PRIYANKA JAISWAL
3. BBC News — by Olivia Ireland
4. NPR News — by Mamita Bhandari

Read the original at ABC News Australia

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