KATHMANDU: Individuals from Nepal’s flood-hit capital returned to their mud-caked houses on Sunday (September 29) to examine the damage left by devastating floods that killed at least 170 people throughout the Himalayan country.
Floods and landslides caused by heavy rains are typical in South Asia during the monsoon season, which runs from June to September. Still, experts fear climate change is increasing their occurrence and severity.
Over the weekend, entire neighborhoods in Kathmandu were swamped, with flash floods reported in rivers that flow through the capital and major damage to roadways connected the city to the rest of Nepal.
Kumar Tamang, who lives in a slum along a riverside, told AFP that he and his family were forced to evacuate after midnight on Saturday when water surged into their shanty.
“We returned this morning, and everything looks different,” the 40-year-old explained.
“We couldn’t even open the doors to our house, it was jammed with mud,” he told me. “Yesterday we were afraid that the water would kill us, but today we have no water to clean” .
The Nepalese Home Ministry stated that 170 people had been killed around the country, with another 42 still missing.
According to ministry spokesman Rishi Ram Tiwari, bulldozers are being utilized to clean many roadways clogged with debris, blocking Kathmandu off from the rest of Nepal.
“More than 3,000 people have been rescued,” he said.
Around 35 people died and were buried alive when mud from a landslide crashed into a roadway south of Kathmandu, according to Nepal Police spokesman Dan Bahadur Karki.
The Department of Hydrology and Meteorology announced that early data from 14 districts showed record-breaking rainfall in the 24 hours leading up to Saturday morning.
It stated that a station at the Kathmandu airport recorded approximately 240mm of rain, the most since 2002.
CHEST-DEEP WATER
The Bagmati River and its multiple streams that flow through Kathmandu burst their banks at approximately midnight on Saturday, flooding local homes and vehicles.
Residents fought through chest-deep water to reach higher land.
Bishnu Maya Shrestha, who resided in another inundated neighborhood of Kathmandu, stated that they had to cut the roofs off their homes to escape.
“We jumped from one roof to another to safety and finally they came with boats to rescue us,” Shrestha told the news agency AFP.
As many as 3,000 security personnel were dispatched to aid rescue efforts using helicopters and motorboats.
Rescuers were utilizing rafts to transport people to safety.
Humanitarian organizations are also assisting with search and rescue efforts, as well as offering aid.
In an update on social media site X, Jagan Chapagain, chairman of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, stated that staff and volunteers are “distributing non-food items, providing hygiene kits, and setting up evacuation centers.”
Domestic flights resumed in and out of Kathmandu on Sunday morning after being grounded since Friday evening due to inclement weather, with more than 150 departures cancelled.
The summer monsoon provides 70-80 percent of South Asia’s annual rainfall.
Monsoon rains from June to September cause significant death and destruction throughout South Asia each year, but the frequency of devastating floods and landslides has increased in recent years.
Experts believe climate change has increased their frequency and severity.
A landslide on a road in the Chitwan area in July swept two busses carrying 59 people into a river.
Three people escaped alive, however, officials were only able to remove 20 remains from the crash due to surging floodwaters.
This year, more than 260 people died in Nepal due to rain-related calamities.