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🇸🇬 Singapore /Disasters & Emergencies

Nepal’s wall of missing offers a last hope after Himalayan flood

From The Straits Times · () English

Translated from English and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

In-depth Named sources Ongoing story
  • Families have posted photographs on a 25-metre wall in Kathmandu while searching for people missing after floods triggered by a glacier collapse on the China-Nepal border.
  • Nearly 4,500 people remain missing, including almost 4,000 in Nepal and about 600 foreigners, while more than 900 people have died.
  • Relatives also search for recovered bodies at a hospital morgue, and police are helping identify them.

A 25-metre wall outside Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital has become a gallery of fading hope. Families have covered it with photographs of relatives missing after the Aug. 26 floods, adding images to columns when the wall could hold no more.

Nearly 4,500 people are missing after a glacier collapsed on the China-Nepal border and sent a tsunami-like surge of freezing water and debris downstream. More than 900 people died. Almost 4,000 of those still unaccounted for were in Nepal, including nearly 600 foreigners.

He was carrying nine pilgrims to Gosaikunda. Of the nine, one survived after jumping from the vehicle.

— Prakash ChhetriHe described how his brother disappeared while transporting pilgrims during the flood.

Prakash Chhetri, 46, placed a photograph of his brother on the wall. He said his brother had been carrying nine pilgrims to Gosaikunda, and that only one survived after jumping from the vehicle. Debu Sapkota, 58, posted pictures of his 83-year-old mother-in-law and granddaughter, who disappeared in Trishuli Bazaar. “I am here hoping to find their bodies,” he said.

I am here hoping to find their bodies.

— Debu SapkotaHe spoke after posting photographs of his missing mother-in-law and granddaughter.

The display includes photographs of Chinese workers and engineers at hydropower sites, a Chinese trader who used the Rasuwa border crossing, Indian pilgrims travelling toward Mount Kailash and an American tourist. Crowds gather to film the rows of faces, while nearby photographs of bodies recovered from the mud are shown close to the morgue.

Raj Kumari Tamang, 20, went there looking for her father, Moti Lal Tamang, who had gone to Trishuli Bazaar to pay an electricity bill. His phone tracker last placed him near the Trishuli Bridge, which the flood swept away. Police officer Om Bahadur Rana said the identification office had received 94 bodies.

I don’t know anything more about what happened to him.

— Raj Kumari TamangShe was searching for her father after his phone was last located near the destroyed Trishuli Bridge.
About this summary

Originally published by The Straits Times in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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