Nepal floods: more than 5,500 missing as death toll rises to 1,385 across Nepal-China border
By The South Asia Times
KATHMANDU/BEIJING - More than 5,500 people remain missing after catastrophic flash floods and mudslides devastated communities along the Nepal-China border, with rescue teams continuing to search through vast amounts of mud and debris nearly two weeks after the disaster.
The disaster, which began on Aug. 26, has killed at least 1,385 people in Nepal and China's Tibet Autonomous Region, according to the latest figures reported by authorities from both countries.
In Nepal, authorities' latest figures provided for the disaster show 1,355 bodies recovered, 4,996 people still out of contact and 13,396 people rescued, while authorities have verified the names of 5,006 people in the affected areas.
On the Chinese side, 43 deaths and 519 missing people have been confirmed at the Gyirong border area in Tibet, according to the latest reporting. The missing include 261 foreign nationals from 23 countries.
The catastrophe was triggered on Aug. 26 when a massive glacier and mountain collapse unleashed torrents of water, rock and mud into valleys in Nepal's Langtang region and toward the China-Nepal border.
The resulting floods destroyed homes, roads, bridges, hydropower facilities and the strategically important Gyirong border crossing, a major trade and pilgrimage route between Nepal and Tibet.
Entire communities were overwhelmed within minutes, leaving thousands of people cut off from the outside world.
In Nepal, rescue operations have focused particularly on hydropower projects along the affected rivers, where hundreds of workers are believed to have been trapped in underground tunnels. Officials estimate that around 900 hydropower workers were among those missing, with about 500 believed to be trapped inside tunnels.
Despite the enormous scale of the disaster, rescue teams have continued to find survivors.
A Chinese national, Lu Haitao, was rescued alive from a hydropower tunnel in Nepal 10 days after the floods struck. Two Nepali workers had also been pulled alive from another tunnel days earlier.
Nepali rescuers also found an elderly woman, Chandika Kumari Shrestha, alive inside an air pocket in her collapsed home after her family had already begun mourning her as dead.
The discoveries have raised hopes that additional survivors could still be found in tunnels and collapsed structures.
