Rescue teams in Nepal have increased their efforts to reach more than 600 workers believed to be trapped inside blocked hydropower tunnels after last week's deadly flash flood.
Nepali officials said the focus was on 11 hydropower projects in the country, including in the hard-hit districts of Rasuwa and Nuwakot. Pictures and video shared by rescue teams showed heavy machinery being used to dig through mud and rock in the dark to reach those trapped.
“A large amount of debris has been deposited and that is posing us a big challenge to open the tunnels,” Nepalese army spokesman Raja Ram Basnet told Reuters. “Our main focus is on opening the tunnels.”
At least 955 people have died and 4,471 remain missing in Nepal and China after a glacial collapse last week unleashed a deluge of ice, rock, mud and debris across the border between Nepal an China's Tibet region. Rescuers have struggled to reach isolated communities.
Nepal has reported 939 deaths and said 3,925 people remain missing, while Chinese authorities said 16 people died and 546 were missing in Tibet’s Gyirong county. The disaster also damaged key infrastructure, including hydropower projects in the Nuwakot and Rasuwa districts, said the Independent Power Producers’ Association in Nepal.
About 11,400 people have been rescued, with more than 21,000 security personnel sent to assist recovery operations, Nepal's National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority said. As of Monday evening, data from the authority showed 639 people were missing from hydropower projects.
Nepali Prime Minister Balendra Shah described the flood as an “unprecedented and devastating natural disaster”. Authorities have faced challenges in compiling a complete assessment of the damage, he added.
Nepal has undergone a recent boom in hydropower development as the country looks to use its Himalayan water resources to address chronic domestic power shortages and export electricity to its southern neighbour, India. Hydropower projects in Nepal's mountains rely on tunnels to carry water through the steep terrain – the same tunnels now at the centre of the rescue effort.
geologist
Operations have been suspended several times owing to bad weather and concerns that a lake formed by the deluge could cause more flooding, after it began to overflow into Nepali rivers.
South Korea is to send a 44-member emergency relief team to Nepal on Tuesday to support rescue operations, after flooding in the Rasuwa region. The move follows a request by Nepal for assistance, the South Korean Foreign Ministry said.
Arnold Dix, a geologist with experience in tunnel rescue missions, said he was acting as an adviser for about six hydropower project tunnel rescues in Nepal. But the sheer number of operations needed, along with concerns about more flash floods, has made the search challenging, he added.
“It’s not like we’ve just got one disaster,” Mr Dix said. “We’ve got lots of disasters and our resources are thin as well.”
