In the shadow of the Himalayas, Nepal paused on the thirteenth day of its traditional mourning cycle to honor more than a thousand lives erased when a glacier gave way and sent walls of ice, rock, and water through a valley that straddled two nations. The disaster, still unfinished in its accounting, has left over five thousand people unaccounted for — a number that speaks not only to the scale of physical destruction but to the fragility of human settlement at the edge of a warming world. Even as flags descended to half mast, rescue teams chose presence over ceremony, pressing into flooded tu
Nepal marks final day of mourning for 1,287 flood victims as rescue efforts intensify
At least 1,287 people confirmed dead, over 5,000 missing, with hundreds of hydropower workers unaccounted for in tunnels and buried structures across the disaster zone.
No one is still stranded—that was the promise
Mark
So this was the last day of mourning, but the rescue work didn't stop. Why hold a mourning period if people are still missing?
Mimi
The mourning period is a cultural practice—thirteen days in Hindu tradition. But the government made a deliberate choice to keep rescue operations running instead of holding big state ceremonies. They're saying the search for survivors matters more than formal rituals.
Luke
That's a practical decision, but it's worth noting that 5,000 people are still missing. We don't know if they're dead or alive. The mourning period assumes a certain closure that doesn't actually exist yet.
Mark
The hydropower tunnels seem to be where most of the hope is. Why are so many people missing from there?
Mimi
Hundreds of workers were inside the tunnels when the flood hit. These are massive infrastructure projects in a remote region. The tunnels are complex—multiple levels, multiple sections. That's why they need specialized rescue experts like Arnold Dix.
Luke
But we should be clear: four people rescued in recent days, three from tunnels. That's a very small number against hundreds missing. The tunnels are where rescuers think survivors might still be, but that's an assumption based on the structure, not on confirmed signs of life.
Mark
That woman found after ten days—how does someone survive that long buried in a house?
Mimi
She was on the fourth floor, so she wasn't completely crushed. There was air, space, shelter. The building protected her even as it trapped her. It's the kind of accident that keeps you alive.
Luke
It's also the kind of story that can skew how we think about the overall rescue effort. One survival after ten days is remarkable and real, but it doesn't tell us much about the odds for the thousands still missing. We don't know if her situation was typical or exceptional.
Mark
What about the Chinese side? It seems like fewer casualties there.
Mimi
The death toll reported was 31 with 531 missing, compared to 1,287 dead and over 5,000 missing on the Nepal side. The flood may have hit Nepal harder, or the reporting may be different. We're getting numbers from Chinese media, not direct confirmation.
Luke
Exactly. We have different sources reporting from different countries with different systems. The 31 deaths on the Tibetan side comes from Chinese media reporting on Friday. We don't have independent verification of those numbers, and we don't know if the missing count includes the same categories of people as the Nepal count.
Il Polso
- A glacial collapse along the Nepal-Tibet border unleashed a catastrophic flash flood that has now claimed at least 1,287 confirmed lives, with more than 5,000 people still unaccounted for across buried villages and submerged infrastructure.
- Hundreds of hydropower workers trapped inside a labyrinth of underground tunnels represent the most urgent and technically complex dimension of the rescue — teams are operating around the clock, above ground and below, in terrain that shifts the rules of conventional search operations.
- An Australian tunnel rescue expert describes the effort as multiple overlapping crises unfolding simultaneously, each site carrying its own dangers, demanding that rescuers divide their focus without losing their urgency.
- A 64-year-old woman found alive on the fourth floor of her partially buried home — more than ten days after the flood — has become a fragile but powerful symbol that survival remains possible, keeping rescue teams moving forward despite narrowing odds.
- The disaster has crossed national borders, with Chinese teams recovering bodies and reporting hundreds missing on the Tibetan side, underscoring that this catastrophe belongs to no single country and will require grief and reckoning on both sides of the mountain.
In the shadow of the Himalayas, Nepal paused on the thirteenth day of its traditional mourning cycle to honor more than a thousand lives erased when a glacier gave way and sent walls of ice, rock, and water through a valley that straddled two nations. The disaster, still unfinished in its accounting, has left over five thousand people unaccounted for — a number that speaks not only to the scale of physical destruction but to the fragility of human settlement at the edge of a warming world. Even as flags descended to half mast, rescue teams chose presence over ceremony, pressing into flooded tunnels and buried structures with the quiet conviction that the living must be sought before the dead are fully mourned.
On the thirteenth and final day of Nepal's traditional Hindu mourning period, the country observed a national day of grief for the victims of a glacial flood that had torn through a Himalayan valley two weeks prior. Flags flew at half mast, candles were lit, and yet the government chose to forgo formal ceremonies — the search for survivors, officials said, could not wait for ritual.
The disaster, believed triggered by a glacier's collapse along the Nepal-Tibet border, had buried entire villages under ice, rock, and mud. At least 1,287 people were confirmed dead, and more than 5,000 remained missing. Nepal's president toured the devastated zones on Monday, bearing witness to what the flood had left behind. The National Emergency Operation Centre made clear that rescue operations took precedence over commemoration.
Much of the search had narrowed to a particularly treacherous front: the hydropower tunnels riddling the region, where hundreds of workers had been when the flood struck. Army teams worked continuously underground and from the air, guided by the single objective of leaving no one stranded. An Australian tunnel rescue expert advising the operation described it as a constellation of simultaneous crises, each with its own dangers and unknowns.
Small signs of hope persisted. Four people had been pulled from tunnels or hydropower stations in recent days. On Saturday, a 64-year-old woman was found alive on the fourth floor of her partially buried home in Nuwakot district — more than ten days after the initial disaster — and airlifted to a hospital in Kathmandu. Her survival reminded rescuers why the effort continued.
Across the border, Chinese teams recovered twelve bodies along the Tibetan frontier using excavators and ground-penetrating radar, with at least 31 dead and 531 missing reported on that side alone. The full human cost of the catastrophe remained unresolved, its final numbers still forming in the rubble — but the teams pressed on, because the possibility of one more life saved was reason enough.
Across Nepal on Monday, flags hung at half mast and candles were lit in darkened rooms. The country was marking the thirteenth and final day of its traditional Hindu mourning period for the victims of a catastrophic flash flood that had swept through a Himalayan valley two weeks earlier. The disaster, believed to have been triggered by the collapse of a glacier, had claimed at least 1,287 lives. More than 5,000 people remained unaccounted for.
The scale of loss was still unfolding. Along the border between Nepal and Tibet, entire villages had been buried under walls of ice, rock, and mud. The government had scaled back formal commemorations, choosing instead to let rescue teams continue their work uninterrupted. Phanindra Paudel, speaking for the National Emergency Operation Centre, explained that no official ceremonies would be held—the search for survivors took precedence. Nepal's president, Ram Chandra Paudel, toured the devastated areas on Monday, witnessing firsthand what the flood had left behind.
The rescue operation had become increasingly focused on a specific and dangerous terrain: the hydropower tunnels that honeycomb the region. Hundreds of workers had been inside these tunnels when the flood struck, and many remained missing. Army spokesperson Raja Ram Basnet told the BBC that rescue efforts were intensifying in these underground passages, with teams conducting continuous search operations around the clock. The work was happening on the ground and from the air simultaneously, he said, with one clear objective: to ensure no one remained stranded.
The tunnels presented a puzzle of their own. Arnold Dix, an Australian tunnel rescue expert advising Nepali teams, described the operation as a series of overlapping crises unfolding in different locations at once, each carrying its own set of dangers and uncertainties. Four people had been rescued in recent days—three of them pulled from hydropower stations or tunnels. On Saturday, a 64-year-old woman had been found alive on the fourth floor of her partially buried house in Nuwakot district, more than ten days after the initial disaster. Nepal's Armed Police Force had discovered her and airlifted her to a hospital in Kathmandu. The fact that she had survived so long trapped in her home offered a sliver of hope that others might still be found alive in the wreckage.
The disaster had crossed borders. On Sunday, Chinese rescue workers recovered twelve bodies along the Nepal-Tibet frontier, using excavators, shovels, and ground-penetrating radar to search through the debris. Chinese media reported that on the Tibetan side, at least 31 people had died, with 531 more missing. The full scope of the catastrophe—the number of dead, the number still missing, the number who might yet be found alive—remained incomplete. At least 5,083 people were unaccounted for in Nepal alone. The rescue teams knew that time was working against them, that the longer the search continued, the smaller the chances of finding survivors. Yet they pressed forward into the tunnels, into the rubble, into the uncertainty, because the possibility of saving even one more life justified the effort.
Citazioni salienti
We are making sure that no one is still stranded.— Raja Ram Basnet, Army spokesperson
Multiple potential rescues, unfolding at the same time, in different places, each with its own dangers, uncertainties and lives that may still be saved.— Arnold Dix, Australian tunnel rescue expert advising Nepali teams
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Politics & Governance