They Survived the Flood. Their Families Did Not.

Purna Bahadur Ghale had only seconds to decide whether to run when the Bhotekoshi River burst through settlements in Nepal’s Rasuwa district on August 26. He fled toward his home in Khalte, but the flood reached the village before he could get there.

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Seconds made the difference between life and death.

Ghale, a 43-year-old executive member of Uttargaya Rural Municipality, escaped by climbing into a forest. He spent two days there before a Nepali Army helicopter rescued him and took him to Bidur in neighbouring Nuwakot. He returned to Uttargaya on Sunday after a five-hour journey.

Seven members of his family are missing: his 75-year-old father, Subba Ghale; his 16-year-old son, Krishna; his elder son’s 24-year-old wife, Suchita; his brother’s wife, Som Maya, also 24; their daughters Binusa, five, and Sunita, three; and his 10-year-old nephew, Bikram Tamang.

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I know neither whether they are alive nor where their bodies are.

“Seconds made the difference between life and death,” Ghale said from a holding centre at Shivalaya Basic School in Laharepauwa. He said he called his family after hearing that the flood was coming and told them to run, then rushed home to help them. He never reached the house. After repeated calls, the phones went dead.

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I escaped the flood. When I first heard that it was coming, I called home and told everyone to run.

The villages of Khalte, Gogane, Tiru and Karmarang suffered heavy losses. Bodies have begun appearing along the riverbanks, some so badly damaged that identification is difficult. Ghale said none of Khalte’s 257 houses remained intact. Despite losing his own family, he was compiling information on the missing because of his municipal role. By Sunday, he had counted 54 people.

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Not a single house is intact.