A excavator is working to restore a road link to the flood-hit areas on Nepal-China border.
KATHMANDU: Nepal and China resumed rescue operations that had been suspended briefly in the flood-hit Himalayas after risks from an overflowing lake were found to be manageable, easing fears of fresh devastation, the media reported.
Wednesday’s (August 26) catastrophic flood caused by a glacier collapse killed 547 people in Nepal and five in China’s Tibet, with almost 1,000 more missing in the two countries.
A huge torrent of rock, ice, mud and debris cascaded through Himalayan mountain river systems after the collapse, and also led to the formation of a lake where water continued to collect and rise.
On Friday (August 28), the lake’s reservoir had topped 2.5 million cubic metres of water, up from the estimated 1.5-2 million cubic metres recorded a day earlier, before overflowing into the Lhende Khola river and then into the Trishuli, authorities and witnesses in Nepal said.
The overflow sparked panic and warnings from authorities in Nepal, leading to rescue operations being suspended for about three hours. The risk of the lake bursting had prompted all Chinese rescue personnel and vehicles to withdraw on the Chinese side as well and stand by in a safe area, state broadcaster CCTV said.
Both resumed rescue operations after the threat eased.
“By noon, as the risk posed by the upstream dammed lake was deemed manageable, rescue operations for the Gyirong mudslide disaster quickly resumed and were stepped up,” Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said.
Nepal’s army spokesperson Raja Ram Basnet said that rescue operations had been temporarily halted after the flood alert but it was found that the rise in the water level was only by about 2 feet.
Wednesday’s flood ripped through villages and valleys, destroying power stations, roads and bridges along a route that links Kathmandu with Lhasa in Tibet and is popular with trekkers and pilgrims. Of those missing, at least 540 are foreigners, many of them Hindu pilgrims from India headed to the holy Mount Kailash and Lake Mansarovar in Tibet.
More than 90,000 people are estimated to be affected, the Red Cross said, adding that trucks with relief supplies were blocked after the barrier lake broke its banks.
In Beijing, China’s Politburo met on Friday to direct rescue work, state media reported.
Authorities must “scientifically formulate search-and-rescue plans, make every effort to search for missing people from China and abroad,” the meeting chaired by President Xi Jinping said, according to state news agency Xinhua.
The meeting called for stronger monitoring of glacier lakes, landslide risks and barrier lakes, emergency aid to affected areas in Nepal, and closer international disaster cooperation.
China’s Premier Li Qiang, the country’s No 2 official, arrived in the disaster-stricken area of Gyirong on Thursday afternoon, state-run Xinhua news agency said. The visit suggested Beijing was treating the disaster as a matter of the highest national priority.
Chinese rescuers had yet to reach the worst-hit site on the Chinese side of the border, the Gyirong border crossing, by Thursday, state media reports indicated, as crews worked to clear debris from the key access road leading to the area.
Dramatic footage on Wednesday showed enormous torrents of muddy water and debris tearing through structures in the Nepal and China border crossing area within seconds and engulfing people trying to flee. – News Agencies
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