Himlung Avalanche Kills Two in Nepal, Leaves a Dozen Missing
An avalanche on Mount Himlung in Nepal killed at least two people and left a dozen or more expedition workers missing, with rescue teams still searching on Sept. 28. The slide struck on Sunday. It hit a base camp, the main staging camp where teams store shelter and supplies, on the 7,126-metre peak in north-central Nepal. Support staff were preparing the camp for foreign clients due to arrive for the autumn climbing season. Al Jazeera
At least 10 people were rescued after the avalanche. The bodies of the two people killed were airlifted, flown out by helicopter, on Monday to Kathmandu airport and taken to Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital. Tul Singh Gurung, president of the Nepal National Mountain Guide Association, told AFP that two bodies were recovered as rescuers worked until 6pm (12:30 GMT).
All those killed or missing were Nepali nationals. A team of eight mountain guides is leading the search on site, and Gurung told dpa that additional search and rescue workers were heading to the area. Rescue work is underway in ongoing bad weather, according to parallel reporting News18. The weather is slowing helicopters and ground movement.
Reported counts have differed. Al Jazeera headlined the search for 12 missing on Sept. 28 while also quoting Gurung as saying the search continues for 14 expedition workers. Other accounts published Sept. 28 described the two dead as guides and the missing as kitchen staff working at the camp, with an early count of 16 missing reduced to 14 after the two guides were found dead Straits Times. A dpa report published Sept. 27 listed two dead and 14 missing.
Himlung Himal sits in Manang district. Flooding and landslides were reported there over the weekend due to heavy rainfall. Nepal's National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority said 21 other people were killed and five more were missing in different parts of the country between Thursday and Sunday.
The broader context here is how expedition labor and late-monsoon weather overlap. Foreign clients had yet to arrive. Nepali guides and kitchen staff were already at base camp building out supplies and shelter, so pre-season risk fell on support personnel. Heavy rain at lower elevations and extra snow weight higher up, like added load on a sloped roof, can destabilize slopes while also closing the air routes and trails needed for backup and evacuation. The national toll points to a multi-district emergency stretching airlift and rescue capacity.
Looking at what comes next, the key variables are weather, access and parallel demand. Eight guides on site with reinforcements en route is a limited team for debris search at altitude. Continued bad weather constrains helicopter rotation and ground movement. Competing deaths and disappearances elsewhere in the country pull on the same disaster-management resources. Clarifying the missing-persons list will determine the scale and duration of the operation.
