Rescue efforts intensify after Nepal-Tibet flooding as deaths climb past 900

KATHMANDU, Nepal, Aug 31, (AP): Rescuers were trying to find trapped workers in at least a dozen hydroelectric plant sites Monday after catastrophic flooding in Nepal and Tibet killed at least 900 people and left more than 4,700 missing. Multiple foreign teams were assisting local rescuers to find workers in multiple tunnels at Nepal's power plants on the rivers that flooded last Wednesday.

Mohan Kumar Dangi, president of the Independent Power Producers Association of Nepal, or IPPAN, said the floods damaged at least 12 hydropower projects across Rasuwa and Nuwakot districts and about 900 people were missing from the project sites. Officials have previously offered varying estimates of the number trapped.

"We are working in search and rescue of the stranded people from hills, settlements and river areas,” said Brig. Gen. Raja Ram Basnet, Nepal’s army spokesman. Nepal’s disaster agency said Monday that 903 deaths had been counted in that country, with 4,247 people, including 592 foreigners, missing. As of Sunday, Chinese authorities reported 16 deaths and 546 missing, and Chinese state media said 261 of the missing were foreigners, including over a hundred Nepalis.

Workers shoveling mud from a flood-ravaged power station in Dhading, Nepal, told The Associated Press that the station is a key node for providing power to over 20,000 people in the region. The workers cleaning the power station said they hope that it is not rebuilt near the river. Rescue efforts are focused on people trapped in the gigantic tunnels built for controlling the waterflow to produce hydropower.

"The tunnels are built to access hydropower infrastructure and to divert water - an essential step to generate energy. These tunnels are big enough to drive trucks through,” said Jakob Steiner, a geoscientist at the University of Graz in Austria who is currently based in Dhaka, Bangladesh. "There is enough place for people to take refuge safely inside and from what we understand they have managed to get oxygen to some of those stuck inside and are trying to rescue them now.

It’s a race for time though as people need food and water." In the Upper Trishuli-1 Hydropower Project, in the hard-hit Rasuwa district, at least 576 were missing, Dangi said, adding that around 300 of them were believed to be trapped inside the project’s tunnel. Rescuers have been trying to find survivors for days, working through the rain.