A Glacier Collapsed and Flooded the Nepal-Tibet Border: Here's What's Happening

A Chinese rescue team arrived at the Gyirong border crossing on Friday and found "nothing but ruins." Five days earlier, a massive piece of a glacier had broken off and crashed into a valley, sending a powerful wave of water and debris rushing through the Nepal-Tibet border region. At least 626 people have died in Nepal and seven in China's Tibet region.

The 21-person team, with a search-and-rescue dog, had to cross mountains and valleys and use ropes to get through forests and along cliff edges because the roads were gone. Rescue worker Zou Mingqi described the route: "There was no road … it was all virgin forest and sheer cliffs." Surveillance camera footage from the crossing showed huge torrents of water and debris swallowing buildings and people trying to flee on Wednesday, two days before the team arrived The Guardian.

The number of people missing was raised to nearly 3,000 on Saturday: 2,426 in Nepal and 554 in Tibet. The death toll has climbed sharply over the week. Reuters reported 157 bodies recovered on August 26, then at least 359 dead and nearly 1,000 missing by August 27. Chinese state broadcaster CCTV then reported 558 missing in Tibet's Gyirong County alone. Al Jazeera, in an earlier report, noted that Nepal police had recovered 162 bodies on the Wednesday of the flood while Chinese authorities confirmed at least three deaths at that stage.

A glacier is a large, slow-moving sheet of ice on a mountainside. In this case, a portion of one broke off and crashed down to the valley floor, triggering a flash flood, which is a sudden, fast-moving flood that happens with little or no warning. Satellite images showed a green mountainside buried in debris after the collapse Reuters.

The disaster has overwhelmed rescue teams on both sides of the border. In Nepal, rescuers including army personnel and police are using drilling equipment to reach more than 100 people trapped inside a tunnel at a hydropower plant in Rasuwa. More than 350 people had already been evacuated from the tunnel site under what Nepal's prime minister's office called "extremely risky" conditions, with the rescue effort described as "extremely challenging" due to bad weather.

Nepal has been careful about accepting outside help. On Friday, the foreign ministry in Kathmandu said it could handle rescue efforts on its own for now and turned down general search-and-rescue assistance from other countries. Foreign Minister Shisir Khanal was direct: "We think there is no need for repetition in this." But Nepal is asking for foreign help in specific areas where it does not have enough expertise. Khanal listed the needs: rebuilding transport and communication links where bridges were destroyed, identifying dead bodies, DNA testing, rescuing people stuck in tunnels, and storing bodies for longer periods.

Nepal has asked its neighbours India and China for bailey bridges, which are portable steel bridges that can be put together quickly without special equipment. Roughly two dozen bridges were destroyed in the floods. India sent three flights carrying about 60 tons of relief supplies, including blankets, medicines, food, water purification tablets, and a team specialised in tunnel rescues. China called for emergency aid to the disaster areas and for international rescue cooperation, though it did not give details on what it was sending to Nepal The Guardian.

There is a second danger hanging over the rescue operation. When debris from the flood blocked river channels, it created what are called barrier lakes, which are pools of water that form behind a natural dam of rocks and dirt. If that dam breaks, the water can rush downstream and cause more flooding. A Nepali official warned that flood risks will continue until both lakes fully drain. Satellite imagery showed a second barrier lake growing larger with no visible way for the water to flow out, which means water pressure could still be building. China's state-run Xinhua news agency reported that the first barrier lake was getting smaller, based on analysis by China's water resources ministry. On Thursday, both Nepal and China warned of new flooding risks. By Friday, rescue operations started again on both sides, but those risks were still present Reuters.

The broader context here is important. This disaster happened in one of the most sensitive political areas in the Himalayas. The Gyirong crossing connects Tibet and Nepal and has long been used for trade and religious pilgrimages between the two countries. Nepal's choice to turn down general rescue help while asking for specific technical aid from both India and China fits a pattern in Kathmandu's foreign policy: accepting help from both of its large neighbours without letting either one take charge of the response. India's quick delivery of relief supplies and a tunnel rescue team, along with China's call for international cooperation, puts both countries in the role of helpful partners to a Nepali government that is clearly managing the public image of the crisis as carefully as the rescue work on the ground.

The rising death toll, the workers still trapped in the tunnel, and the unstable barrier lakes all point to a crisis that is still at its most dangerous stage. The revised missing figure of nearly 3,000 suggests the final death toll will be much higher than what we know now. And with a second barrier lake growing and no visible outlet for the water, the threat of more flooding has not yet passed.