Rescuers searching for survivors of Wednesday’s deadly flash floods on the Nepal-Tibet border have been forced to pull back after a debris dam overflowed, increasing the risk of fresh flooding.
Residents in Nepal’s Rasuwa district, on the border with Tibet, were seen rushing up hillsides on Friday to escape a possible surge in the river, according to witnesses. Authorities in Nepal had stopped rescue operations for at least ۹۰ minutes, an army officer said.
A lake formed after a wall of mud and debris struck the border hub of Gyirong in Tibet on Wednesday, causing catastrophic flash floods that thundered down valleys and obliterated villages.
The risk of the lake bursting had prompted Chinese rescue personnel and vehicles to withdraw to a safe area, the Chinese state broadcaster CCTV reported on Friday.
The confirmed death toll from the floods – which were triggered by the collapse of a glacier – rose on Friday to ۴۶۹ in Nepal, with more than ۱,۳۰۰ people missing there and in Tibet.
More than ۵۰۰ foreign citizens were among ۸۲۶ people missing in Nepal, police and tourism officials said, including ۱۷۷ from India, ۹۰ from the US, ۳۴ from Australia, ۳۳ from Britain and ۲۵ from Canada. Chinese state media said at least ۵۵۸ were missing on the Tibet side of the border, of whom at least ۲۶۰ were foreign nationals.
The flood on Wednesday had destroyed power stations, roads and bridges along a route that links Kathmandu with Lhasa in Tibet and is popular with trekkers and pilgrims.
In its wake, debris had formed the barrier lake that was threatening further flooding. China mobilised an eight-member engineering team to conduct aerial surveys and ۳D modelling of the lake on Thursday, and by Friday its reservoir had topped ۲.۵m cubic metres of water, up from the estimated ۱.۵-۲ m cubic metres the engineering team recorded a day earlier.
Rescue efforts in Bidur, the capital of the Nukawot district in Bagmati province, Nepal, were disrupted on Friday morning as the the Trishuli River began to rise again after the lake near the China border burst its banks.
Rescue workers were moved from the area and residents who had tried to return to what remained of their homes were told to evacuate again immediately.
Bidur, once a bustling town on the banks of the Trishuli, now lies in ruins. Most homes were washed away when a tide of mud, rocks and debris surged down the river valley early on Wednesday. Survivors described clinging to buildings and trees as the water rushed over them.
The mangled concrete remains of a bank, a government office and an ATM booth were among the few structures left standing, although they were submerged in mud. Officials said there were still bodies inside the buildings but it was too dangerous to recover them.
Nearby, locals gathered along the muddy road, calling out for lost relatives and trying to dig out what was left of their belongings.
Most areas battered by flash floods remained accessible only by army helicopter. At the Bidur army camp, where much of the rescue effort was being coordinated, rescue and military helicopters flew in and out every five minutes, bringing in dozens of traumatised victims. Many said that in a matter of minutes, the floods had taken their loved ones, their homes and everything they owned.
The international community is scrambling to get aid to flood-stricken parts of Nepal and Tibet.
Nepal has said it does not yet need foreign assistance as the search-and-rescue operation – complicated by the destruction of dozens of bridges and miles of roads across the mountainous region – continues.
“The offer for help is natural,” Lok Bahadur Chhetri, a spokesperson for the foreign ministry, said on Friday. “Our security agencies are doing the search and rescue operation. For now we don’t require such help.”
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The Kathmandu Post reported that India, China, the US, Britain, Japan, South Korea, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh had asked the government to allow their search-and-rescue teams to assist in the operation.
Dinesh Bhattarai, a former Nepali ambassador to the UN in Geneva, said the government’s reluctance to accept foreign assistance may be linked to sensitivities over Rasuwa district and its border with China’s Tibet region.
“They may have thought about the locational sensitivity of the region and decided not to accept foreign teams,” Bhattarai told Reuters.
But Chhetri said Nepal’s own rescue teams were handling the operation and the decision to refuse foreign assistance had nothing to do with sensitivities involving China.
Scant information has emerged from Chinese authorities about the scale of the destruction in Tibet, the most tightly controlled part of China even under normal circumstances. Only brief, state-controlled media reports about the floods have been allowed to circulate in China and the authorities have confirmed only three deaths there. Chinese reports have focused on rescue efforts.
In Nepal earlier on Friday, army helicopter rescue teams were working to free about ۱۰۰ people trapped in a tunnel at a flooded hydropower project.
“Our focus is in search and rescue of people … some people are trapped in the tunnel of Trishuli ۳A hydropower project,” the Nepal army spokesperson, Raja Ram Basnet, said.
“Two helicopters have been dispatched but it is challenging because it is tough to even locate the entry points of the tunnel. Relief efforts are also under way to provide the rescued people what they need.”
The prime minister’s office said the army was working in challenging conditions and had rescued ۳۵۰ workers and local people who were trapped in the tunnel.
Rescue teams reported finding bodies hundreds of miles downstream from the disaster zone in the Chitwan district of Nepal, near the Tibetan border. Dozens of injured people were transported to Kathmandu for advanced medical care and more than ۱۰۰ people were rescued by Nepali army personnel in helicopters.
CCTV said ۴۹۹ Chinese nationals and ۵۵۵ foreigners had been transported out of the disaster zone as of Friday.
With Agence France-Presse and Reuters
