Here's the latest
• Death toll: Contact has still not been established with some parts of Nepal’s hardest-hit areas, the UN says, as the death toll following last week’s Nepal-China border flash floods now exceeds 1,000. More than 4,400 people remain unaccounted for in both countries, according to officials.
• Warning signs: A new report says the glacier that collapsed, triggering the devastating floods, showed visible signs of instability days before the disaster, including brown meltwater and cracks in the surrounding bedrock.
• Glacier risk: Meanwhile, glaciers surrounding an impact crater in Nepal “may still collapse, posing significant potential risks,” according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV, citing China’s Ministry of Water Resources.
• On the ground: Authorities are burying hundreds of unidentified victims in a mass grave, reports CNN’s team in Nepal who also spoke to the man with the Herculean task of reuniting families with the bodies of their missing loved ones.
Experts have long called for better data-sharing across Himalayan borders
Earlier, we reported how Chinese and Nepali officials met in Kathmandu in late May to discuss sharing data and monitoring natural risks along their Himalayan border. Just months ahead of the deadly landslide and flooding that devastated parts of both countries, the meeting – first reported by Reuters – ended without a specific agreement on data-sharing, but instead a plan to hold a second round of talks.
Experts have long been calling for better data-sharing efforts across Himalayan borders, where the risks of natural disasters are only growing and becoming more unpredictable due to climate change.
The recent disaster would have been difficult to pinpoint ahead of time, given that it took place in a “blind spot” that’s not been heavily monitored by either side. But the scale of the catastrophe highlights how critical it is to set up more complex, cross-border monitoring and early warning systems, experts say.
During rescue efforts in recent days, China has been sharing images, satellite and hydrological data of the disaster-stricken area, including early warning information on secondary flood risks, according to Chinese state media.
Number of dead in Nepal reaches 1,050, as nearly 4,000 people still missing
The number of people who have died in Nepal following last week’s catastrophic flooding has risen to at least 1,050, according to a recent update from the country’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority (NDRRMA).
At least 3,916 people are still missing in Nepal, NDRRMA said, including 583 foreign nationals, 639 people working on hydropower projects, as well as members of the Nepali army and police.
A total of 11,993 people have been recorded as rescued since last Wednesday, the NDRRMA update also said.
Families in Nepal long for closure as death toll rises after flooding
Many relatives of people killed in last week’s deadly flooding near the Nepal-China border will likely never receive their loved one’s body, CNN’s Senior International Correspondent Will Ripley reports.
Ripley said some people likely killed in the recent flooding “hadn’t even been recorded on the official list of the missing by the time that I spoke to (their family members).”
“There is a very likely scenario that many, many people who are relatives of victims will never get closure in terms of a body,” he said, adding that some bodies are decomposing so quickly that they’re having to be buried in mass graves.
Chinese and Nepali scientists held May talks on risk monitoring – but no deal yet reached
Chinese and Nepali officials met in Kathmandu in late May to discuss sharing data and monitoring natural risks along their Himalayan border – just months ahead of the deadly landslide and flooding that devastated parts of both countries.
The two sides were yet to come to any specific agreement on data-sharing following the May meeting – which was first reported by Reuters – a Nepali government official told CNN. Instead, they had agreed to meet again later.
“The meeting was intended to create a situation for reaching an agreement to share real-time data (between the) two countries, especially in areas of early warning systems, glacial lake monitoring and joint research in mountain region,” Binod Parajuli, a senior hydrologist with Nepal’s Flood Forecasting Section, told CNN.
Though the Chinese officials, from the Ministry of Water Resources, had invited the Nepali side to Beijing for a second round of talks, a date was yet to be fixed – and was pushed back by the onset of monsoon season, Parajuli said.
“The effort to establish a real time data sharing mechanism between the two countries was delayed,” he said. “We had intended to go to China once the monsoon season ends in Nepal. Before reaching there, this disaster happened.”
A person familiar with additional talks between the Chinese group and Nepal’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority (NDRRMA), which took place during the same visit, said those discussions had been initiated by the Chinese side.
The NDRRMA briefed the Chinese officials on the types of hazards Nepal is facing, in particular from glacial lake outburst floods – and the necessity of cross-border cooperation, according to the source, who declined to be named. The Chinese side gave positive feedback but the two sides were also yet to formalize an arrangement, the source said.
Parajuli, the government official, told CNN: “We should now reach a conclusion in sharing real-time data.”
Several areas in Nepal hit by flooding have received no aid, disaster authority says
Several communities in Nepal’s badly-hit Rasuwa and Nuwakot districts are facing a shortage, or total lack, of aid supplies, according to Nepal’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority (NDRRMA).
A report published today by NDRRMA lists which areas in the country’s north require further aid after last week’s deadly flash flooding.
Elsewhere, in two wards of Nuwakot’s Tarkeshwar Rural Municipality, “no relief materials have reached the affected communities,” and there are no shelter facilities in the area, according to the report.
In another municipality in Nuwakot district, disinfectant and chemicals are needed to “control odour from dead animals and human remains,” the report said. In several parts of Dhading district, drinking water is needed.
The shortages speak to a broader challenge facing rescue workers, after roads and bridges were destroyed by the flooding, restricting access. Contact has still not been established with some areas, the United Nations said Monday.
As hundreds are missing in China, updates have been slow to emerge
At least 16 people have died and 546 people are missing in China after last week’s catastrophic floods took place, state broadcaster CCTV reported on Sunday morning local time.
Among the missing are those who were believed to be at Gyirong port in China when it was hit by a wall of floodwaters on Wednesday morning.
Updates about the missing have been slow to emerge from the area, which cannot be reached by road. The risk of additional flooding and the fact that the area is now covered by thick mud are factors impacting the speed of rescue and recovery efforts there.
Information about the area has been dominated by reports from state media, in addition to official government updates. That’s part of a usual playbook by Chinese authorities who look to closely control information flows and ensure data confirmation ahead of its release – part of efforts both to crack down on fake reports and shape public opinion.
Foreign journalists are also restricted from Tibet without special permissions. CNN is also aware of comments from journalists from outlets that are not China’s national-level official media suggesting they have been barred from reporting in Tibet.
Censors have been keeping close watch on online platforms, removing disaster-related videos posted by ordinary users and reprimanding at least a dozen people authorities accused of spreading fake news about the scale of the disaster.
During major national incidents, the Chinese government is widely seen as swift to crack down on any forms of dissent or organized efforts to respond or share information outside official channels.
In response to a question about assertions that China was not being forthcoming about the scale of the disaster within its borders, a spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry said last Thursday that China has been “releasing information openly, transparently and in a timely manner.”
Read more on this in our full article here.
"In hindsight," warning signs were visible ahead of disaster, new report finds
The glacier that collapsed causing a devastating landslide and flooding had visible signs of change days ahead of the disaster, according to a new report from a consortium of scientists.
“In hindsight, there were some pre-event indications,” including melt water that had turned visibly brown and signs of a crack propagating into the surrounding bedrock slope days before the collapse, scientists said in a report published last week.
The report – which also suggests more comprehensive early warning systems downstream could have saved a “significant number of lives” – comes as the catastrophe has shown what experts say is a need for better warning systems in a vast Himalayan region that is difficult to monitor.
Chinese and Nepali authorities had met as recently as May to discuss bolstering cooperation on monitoring natural hazards in the Himalayas, a government official who was present at that meeting told CNN.
Early warning systems had been set up recently in this region, focusing on several glacial lakes in China, but no operational system was set up in this area for glacier-related hazards, according to the report from the HiRISK scientific consortium, which monitors risk data in mountain environments.
Once the collapse started, however, the warning times from conventional systems would have likely been insufficient for evacuation at a border checkpoint that was among the first areas hit – given just how fast the initial landslide was moving. Further downstream, with warning times of 10 minutes or more, comprehensive systems could have saved lives, the scientists said.
Other experts have said that the glacial collapse highlights the urgency of better monitoring programs – and cooperation between countries – to detect changes.
“There is almost no way that anyone could have detected this event prior – it happened in a blind spot … (making it) extremely difficult to detect,” Austin Lord, a senior fellow in the Energy, Water and Sustainability program at the Stimson Center, wrote in a recent commentary.
He also highlighted “how greater communication, information sharing, and collaborative analysis of transboundary risks between Nepal and China are sorely needed.”
Search efforts continue as Nepal grapples with flood aftermath
Nearly a week on from the devastating floods on the Nepal-China border, search efforts are continuing for the thousands of people missing in the catastrophe.
Mourners are also burying their loved ones, with more than 1,000 people confirmed dead in the past week.
Here are some of the latest images from the ground:
Hospital director says this is a disaster “for the whole world”
A director at the main hospital receiving flood survivors in Kathmandu has said this is not just a disaster for Nepal, but “for the whole world,” as citizens from so many countries are affected.
He told CNN they have treated a total of 72 flood survivors at the hospital, including 33 still being treated. That includes six patients in ICU and 12 patients awaiting surgery.
The wall outside the T.U. Teaching Hospital is covered in posters showing missing people, put up by their families.
They are “searching, searching, searching” between the different hospitals in Kathmandu, hoping for news on their loved ones, Rosyara said.
They are “very sad, very worried, they don’t have their families. They are hurting.”
"If we feel weak, we can’t work": CNN travels with recovery team pulling bodies from river
A CNN team traveled by boat with Nepali police teams searching for bodies washed far downstream by the flood. Here, the Trishuli River is known by a different name, the Narayani, after it merges with another river upstream from the city of Bharatpur.
That city is now the site where hundreds of bodies have been brought as officials work at a painstaking task of identifying them.
The Narayani river is wide and the horizon is flat apart from the green foothills to the north — a world away from the rocky peaks and massive glaciers where the disaster struck almost a week ago. The border with India is about 25 miles away.
The team stopped at one outcrop where the current meets the land and logs and other debris bobbed in the water. They got off and probed the tall grass with sticks, but found no bodies.
They did the same at a small island further downstream, where they said they had previously found several bodies. None were found, but a rotting animal carcass stench was in the air.
When each team had finished searching an area, they blew a whistle to signal the all clear and the journey began again.
These teams have been on the river for days, pulling decomposed bodies from the water.
“The smell of death stays with you,” one member of the recovery team told CNN.
“Everyone feels heavy when they see the dead bodies,” said another.
“These scenes are very heart-wrenching,” the recovery team member said. “But … if we feel weak, we can’t work. … We are keeping ourselves strong and working.”
Risks remain almost a week after flooding, with more than 1,000 dead. Catch up here
At least 1,003 people have died in the floods in Nepal, the country’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority (NDRRMA) said earlier today.
This brings the total number of deaths on the Nepal-China border as a result of the floods to at least 1,019.
Here’s the latest:
- Contact has still not been established with some parts of Nepal’s hardest-hit areas after last week’s flooding, according to a UN report.
- Glaciers surrounding an impact crater in Nepal “may still collapse, posing significant potential risks,” days after the floods, according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV, citing China’s Ministry of Water Resources.
- China will send DNA identification experts to Nepal, foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said during a regular press briefing today.
- Chinese state media reports that a single water tower higher up in the mountains is the only structure still standing in the Gyirong port area that was devastated by massive flood waters almost a week ago.
- The risk posed by one of the key barrier lakes formed after last week’s catastrophic flooding is now “under control” with all of its water discharged, Chinese authorities said today.
CNN’s Billy Stockwell, Sylvie Zhuang and Lauren Kent contributed to this reporting.
Here's how the situation has developed since the flooding began Wednesday
More than a thousand people have been killed and thousands more are missing in Nepal and China due to catastrophic flooding in the cross-border region.
Here’s a look at how the situation has developed since the flooding began last week:
Wednesday
- At 8:37 a.m. Nepal local time on Wednesday (10:52 p.m. Tuesday night ET), shaking is reported by the US Geological Survey (USGS) along the Nepal-China border, north of Kathmandu. Around this time, an “avalanche” of ice and rock tears down a mountainside and into the Lhende Khola River, a tributary of the Bhote Koshi River, which flows from China into Nepal.
- Just before midday local time (around 2 a.m. ET), Reuters reports “a massive flash flood in the Himalayan nation of Nepal.” Roughly two hours later, the country’s national police force reports at least eight deaths as a result.
- By 2:45 p.m. local time (around 5 a.m. ET), Nepal’s Tourism Board says that at least 384 travelers, including 291 foreign nationals, are considered missing. The Red Cross deploys an emergency team to affected areas, its regional office says.
- At 5:55 p.m. local time (8:10 a.m. ET), CNN reports that the death toll in Nepal has risen to at least 17. Less than 25 minutes later, this toll increases to 31. By 11:08 p.m. local time (1:23 p.m. ET), at least 157 people have been reported dead in the flash floods, Nepal Police says.
Thursday
- The number of people reported missing on the Chinese side of the border rises to 558, according to the local government in the city of Shingatse.
- The death toll in Nepal rises to 162, then 270, then 353, then 389 throughout the day, according to the country’s police.
- Rescuers in India recover three bodies in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, with Reuters reporting that raging waters are suspected to have carried mud-covered remains downstream into the country from Nepal.
- The US State Department says that 90 Americans who may have been impacted by the Nepal floods are unaccounted for.
Friday
- The death toll in Nepal once again climbs to 469, then 489, then 538, then 579, according to the national police force.
- A barrier dam lake on the Chinese side of the border bursts its banks, forcing rescue efforts to be paused. They are resumed hours later.
- Chinese Premier Li Qiang laments the “significant loss of life” caused by the flooding, with at least five dead and 550 missing in his country.
Saturday
- By Saturday morning local time, the death toll in Nepal has risen to 616, according to the national police. Throughout the day, this jumps to 626, then 675.
- Local police tell CNN that officials in the central Nepali district of Chitwan are planning to bury hundreds of unidentified bodies in a mass grave at a sacred Hindu site.
- One of two new lakes that have formed near a flood zone along the Nepal-China border has “essentially drained,” China’s state broadcaster CCTV reports.
Sunday
- The death toll in Nepal rises to 734, then 762, then 788, according to Nepal Police.
- Meanwhile, the death toll in China rises to 16, while the number of missing falls to 546, state broadcaster CCTV reports.
- An estimated 898 workers at various hydropower projects in Nepal are unaccounted for, according to the country’s Independent Power Producers’ Association. Rescuers undertake urgent efforts to pump air into a tunnel at a hydropower project along Nepal’s Trishuli river.
Monday
- The death toll in Nepal rises to 903, then 939, with approximately 3,925 people missing. This brings the total number of people missing in Nepal and China to 4,471.
- Nepal’s Prime Minister Balendra Shah says that more than 11,000 people have been rescued since the flooding began.
- A State Department spokesperson says that approximately 80 Americans remain missing in “the Nepal/China cross-border region.”
CNN’s Laura Paddison, Billy Stockwell, Sugam Pokharel, Max Saltman, Sylvie Zhuang, Sophie Tanno, Amarachi Orie, Jennifer Hansler, Bhadra Sharma, Lex Harvey, Nishant Khanal, Sana Noor Haq, Kara Fox, Laura Sharman, Sangi Gurung, Simone McCarthy, Jessie Yeung, Kathleen Magramo and Anup Pradhan contributed to this reporting.
Contact yet to be established with some areas in Nepal, UN says
Contact has still not been established with some parts of Nepal’s hardest-hit areas after last week’s flooding, according to the United Nations.
Major road and bridge damage — which may take weeks to fix — is restricting access, a UN report says.
The report, published Monday and produced by the Office of the UN Resident Coordinator in Nepal, sets out various humanitarian needs across the country’s north in the aftermath of the deadly flash flooding.
What else is in the report? Among the wide-ranging humanitarian challenges, it said some 2,600 children under the age of five, out of an estimated 22,100 affected children, are expected to require treatment for “severe wasting,” while thousands of pregnant women require nutritional support.
Surveillance is needed to track the potential spread of diseases, including cholera, malaria and typhoid fever, among others, the report states.
The report said more than 100 children may have been separated from their parents or caregivers, citing “preliminary reports.” Meanwhile, at least 19 schools have been damaged due to the flooding, the report said.
Risk of glacier collapse remains near flood zone, Chinese authorities say
Glaciers surrounding an impact crater in Nepal “may still collapse, posing significant potential risks,” days after the massive deadly floods in the Himalayan region, according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV, citing China’s Ministry of Water Resources.
The warning marks the second consecutive day that the ministry has raised the possibility of the glaciers collapsing.
The Chinese state broadcaster previously reported that areas of standing water near the mountainside impact crater, which was formed by the glacial collapse last week, were “in a state of overflow.”
Based on new drone footage taken Tuesday morning, the Chinese ministry assessed that the water accumulated in the impact crater of Nepal’s Chhochen Khola River has “basically drained,” and the downstream river is flowing normally. However, the risk of glacier collapse remains, the ministry warned.
CNN’s Fred He contributed to this report.
More than a thousand dead and thousands more missing: The Nepal-China flooding in numbers
More than a thousand people have died since catastrophic flooding hit the Nepal-China border region last Wednesday, with thousands more reported missing.
Here’s a look at the disastrous impact of the flooding in numbers:
Nepal
- At least 1,050 people have died in the floods in Nepal, the country’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority (NDRRMA) said in its latest update a short while ago.
- A further 3,916 people are missing in the catastrophe, the NDRRMA said.
- Some 583 foreign nationals are among the missing, the Nepal Tourism Board said in a statement yesterday, a figure also shared by the NDRRMA.
- Another 315 foreign nationals have been rescued, the tourism board said, including people from India, China, Germany, Bulgaria, Turkey, Italy, the United States, Malta, Switzerland, Russia, Portugal and Oman.
- A further five foreign nationals are in contact with authorities, the tourism board said, three of which are Spanish, one Belgian and one from the US.
- At least 11,993 people have been rescued since the flooding began, the NDRRMA said in its update.
China
- At least 16 people have died in the flooding in China, state broadcaster CCTV reported Sunday morning local time.
- At least 546 people are also missing in China, CCTV reported.
- Among the missing are at least 261 foreigners from 23 countries, authorities said during a press conference Sunday.
- Of those missing, 104 are from Nepal, 49 are from India, 33 are from Latvia, 18 are from the United States, and 15 are from the United Kingdom, Chinese authorities said.
- Foreign nationals from Canada, Australia, South Africa, Russia, Malaysia, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Estonia, France, Ireland, Finland, Lithuania, Portugal, Ukraine, Spain, Hungary and Kazakhstan are also missing, Chinese authorities said yesterday,
CNN’s Bhadra Sharma, Simone McCarthy, Laura Sharman, Billy Stockwell, Anup Pradhan and Kosh Koirala contributed to this reporting.
China says risks posed by a key barrier lake now "under control"
The risk posed by one of the key barrier lakes formed after last week’s catastrophic flooding is now “under control” with all of its water discharged, Chinese authorities said today.
Chinese officials briefly paused their rescue mission last week due to worries of flash flooding when water in the lake began overflowing.
The Purepu Tsangpo barrier lake has now “fully discharged its water, with the risk under control,” China’s state broadcaster CCTV said, citing emergency officials.
The assessment was based on observation posts, video surveillance, slope radar monitoring and early warning systems focused on the lake, CCTV said.
Some context: A barrier lake is a body of water created by debris damming up a river. They can pose major risks of flash flooding if water behind those dams suddenly releases.
Families in China are desperate for information about their loved ones
She kept calling and calling – countless times – but her husband never picked up.
The woman, who CNN has given the pseudonym Lili, said her husband had spoken with a friend at 8:27am on Wednesday. That was roughly 10 minutes before an enormous landslide careened down a mountain in Nepal, generating an explosive flood wave that ripped through a border area with China and continued into Nepal.
Lili hasn’t heard from her husband, who was working on a Chinese construction project in the South Asian country, since.
Hers is one of many families across China desperate for information about loved ones who were in the area when disaster struck, including dozens of Chinese nationals who are believed to have been working across the border in Nepal.
Now, these families are wondering whether rescue efforts in Nepal are reaching their loved ones – and are urgently calling for more proactive updates on the progress of those efforts from within China.
Several family members of such workers traveled to Lhasa, the capital of China’s Tibetan Autonomous Region, on Monday to seek more information from the state-backed construction firm employing their relatives – and to urge the company to step up rescue efforts and share more information.
Families are also asking for local officials in Tibet to help expedite rescue efforts at project sites in Nepal, according to a draft letter to authorities seen by CNN.
More than 1,000 people have been confirmed dead and thousands remain missing after Wednesday’s catastrophe, according to authorities in both China and Nepal. Families from both countries – and around the world – are desperate for news of loved ones in the area, which was also a popular route for international tourists.
Read more on calls for greater transparency, here.
Mass burial takes place in Nepal for unidentified flood victims
Authorities are burying hundreds of unidentified victims after catastrophic flooding overwhelmed morgues and left families unable to reach loved ones. CNN’s Hanako Montgomery reports.
Authorities are burying hundreds of unidentified victims after catastrophic flooding overwhelmed morgues and left families unable to reach loved ones. CNN’s Hanako Montgomery reports.
The latest from our teams on the ground, as the death toll passes 1,000
The number of people killed in last week’s devastating landslide and flash flooding in Nepal and China has topped 1,000 as of Tuesday morning, according to authorities.
As rescue efforts continue for the more than 4,400 people still missing, our teams on the ground in Nepal are telling the heartbreaking and resilient human stories amid scenes of death and destruction.
Catch up on the latest:
• Resilience in the air: Priya Adhikari, Nepal’s first female helicopter pilot, has flown around 100 missions in less than a week, to rescue survivors from hard-hit areas. She spoke to Anderson Cooper about the search effort and what keeps her going.
• A miraculous rescue: 5-year-old Manisha Magar was presumed dead after she was swept away by the catastrophic flooding. Then, her parents saw video footage of her rescue. CNN’s Will Ripley caught up with the family in Kathmandu.
• A difficult reunion: Our reporters spoke to a man in Nepal facing the Herculean task of reuniting families with the bodies of missing loved ones — but after days in the river, many are in a condition making identification difficult. CNN’s Hanako Montgomery reports from a mass burial site where authorities are laying to rest hundreds of unidentified victims.
• Families seek answers: Family members of missing foreigners, a figure which includes about 80 Americans, have travelled to Nepal to search for their loved ones. Anderson Cooper spoke with an American doctor who is looking for her parents. “Our hope is that if they heard the alarms and the warnings, they either drove or they ran,” the doctor said.
