Nepal held a national day of mourning on Monday for victims of devastating glacial floods, as families of missing hydropower workers feared trapped in tunnels prayed rescuers might yet find them alive.
The August 26 glacial and mountain collapse on the China-Nepal border killed at least 1,398 people, with more than 5,500 missing, including around 800 foreigners.
Flags flew at half-mast, with candlelight vigils planned later in the day, as the nation marked the 13th day after the deaths, following Hindu mourning rituals.
Hundreds of hydropower workers are among the missing, but the rescue of three of them from deep inside tunnels — two Nepalis on Friday and a Chinese man on Saturday — have buoyed hopes that more could still be alive.
Nepal Army spokesman Raja Ram Basnet said rescue efforts were continuing at “the same tempo” to make sure “that no one is still stranded”.
Entire communities have been swept away, with roads destroyed and homes demolished.
• ‘Hope’ –
But families of some of the missing workers who gathered in the capital Kathmandu said the government must move faster.
“We have a lot of hope,” said Reena Amatya Shrestha, whose brother is among the missing.
“They say they are doing rescue. If the rescue is there, where’s the result? We need the result.”
Australian tunnel rescue expert Arnold Dix, who is advising Nepali teams, said the operation presented an unprecedented challenge.
“We are facing something I have never faced before,” said Dix, president of the International Tunnelling and Underground Space Association, in a post on social media.
“Not one rescue, but multiple potential rescues, unfolding at the same time, in different places, each with its own dangers, uncertainties, and lives that may still be saved.”
Foreign experts, including from China, India and South Korea, are aiding Nepali teams in rescue efforts.
“We are measured not only by the lives we save, but by the lives we refuse to abandon,” said Dix.
Drone pilot Adarsha Raj Bhusal recalled sinking into mud after leaping from a helicopter into the flood-ravaged Upper Trishuli-1 hydropower tunnel in Rasuwa district days after the disaster.
“The moment I landed I sank into the mud up to my waist,” the 24-year-old told AFP on Monday in Nuwakot district.
“Other soldiers were there to help, but they were struggling just as much as I was. That’s how bad the conditions were… It was intense the entire way in.”
• ‘New life’ –
Nepal President Ram Chandra Paudel visited relief camps in Nuwakot district on Monday, speaking to those left homeless by the disaster “caused by the unprecedented flooding”, his office said in a statement.
With mortuaries overflowing, Nepal has buried hundreds of bodies in mass graves after taking DNA samples for future identification, according to police.
Despite the gloom, there have been remarkable tales of survival.
Chandika Shrestha, a 64-year-old Nepali woman, was pulled out alive from her mud-covered home in Bidur on Saturday.
Shrestha’s family had already held a symbolic funeral ceremony, believing her dead.
“Chandika has got a new life,” her neighbour Buddhi Lal Dongol told AFP. “It would be so good if the others who are missing also came back.”
While the exact cause of the glacial collapse is unclear, climate change is accelerating glacial melting worldwide, increasing the risk of such disasters.
Nepal, a largely rural nation of 30 million people that has contributed little to the greenhouse gas emissions driving global warming, has said reconstruction could cost billions of dollars.
Its economy is already under pressure, with limited resources to respond to a disaster of this scale.
A UN preliminary assessment estimated building damage from Nepal’s floods at $158 million alone, warning that total losses — including damage to roads and bridges, agricultural land and humanitarian costs — would be far higher.
The disaster has come just ahead of the anniversary of last year’s September 8-9 mass anti-corruption protests that toppled the government.
Rescuers have retrieved 1,355 bodies in Nepal, while around 4,996 people are missing, according to the disaster agency.
On Monday, local volunteer groups in Kathmandu packed utensils, blankets and clothes to be distributed to survivors.
“As Nepalis, we’ve always been told that you look after your people,” volunteer Ashim GC told AFP.
“And these are our people.”
AFP
