A man carrying a sack of flour wades through flood waters after the Bagmati River overflowed following heavy monsoon rains in Kathmandu on September 28, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Low-lying neighbourhoods in Nepal’s capital Kathmandu were inundated by surging floodwaters on Sunday (September 29, 2024) after ferocious monsoon rains that police said had killed at least 101 people around the Himalayan republic.

Deadly rain-related floods and landslides are common across South Asia during the monsoon season from June to September, but experts say climate change is increasing their frequency and severity.

Large swathes of eastern and central Nepal have been inundated since Friday with flash floods reported in several rivers and extensive damage to the country’s highways.

“The death toll has reached 101, and 64 people are missing,” police spokesperson Dan Bahadur Karki told AFP.

“There is likely to be an increase in the death toll as our search and rescue mission proceeds in the affected areas,” he added.

The Kathmandu valley recorded 240 millimetres (9.4 inches) of rain in the 24 hours to Saturday morning, the country’s weather bureau told the Kathmandu Post newspaper.

It was the highest rainfall recorded in the capital since at least 1970, the report said.

People wade through a flooded road near the bank of the overflowing Bagmati River following heavy rains, in Kathmandu, Nepal September 27, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Incessant rains in Nepal have unleashed floods and landslides that killed at least 10 people with seven missing during the last 24 hours, while disrupting transport, officials said on Saturday (September 28, 2024).

Most rivers in the Himalayan nation have swollen, spilling over roads and bridges, authorities said, after nearly a week’s delay in the retreat of South Asia’s annual monsoon rains brought torrential downpours across the region.

Police were working to clear debris and re-open roads to traffic after landslides blocked highways at 28 locations, police spokesman Dan Bahadur Karki said.

The earliest let-up in the rains might not come until Sunday, said Binu Maharjan, a weather forecasting official in the capital, Kathmandu, who blamed a low-pressure system over parts of neighbouring India for this year’s extended rains.

“Heavy rains are likely to continue until Sunday morning and weather is likely to clear after that,” Maharjan told Reuters.

Most central and eastern areas had received moderate to extremely heavy rains, ranging from 50 mm (2 inches) to more than 200 mm (8 inches), she added, with moderate levels elsewhere.

International flights were operating but many domestic flights were disrupted, said Rinji Sherpa, a spokesperson for Kathmandu airport.

Roads and homes in the hill-ringed capital have been inundated after rivers overflowed with more than 200 mm (8 inches) of rain, authorities said.

The Koshi river in the southeast, which causes deadly floods in India’s eastern neighbouring state of Bihar almost every year, was running above the danger level at 450,000 cusecs, versus the normal figure of 150,000 cusecs, one official said.

The river level was still rising, added Ram Chandra Tiwari, the area’s top bureaucrat.

A cusec is a measurement of water flow equivalent to one cubic foot a second.

Hundreds of people die in the monsoon season every year in the landslides and flash floods common in the mountainous nation.

New Delhi:

At least six Indians were among more than 60 people believed to be missing in Nepal after two buses were pushed into a river due to a landslide triggered by heavy rain on Friday.

The two buses, carrying 65 passengers, went missing in the Trishuli River at Simaltal area along the Narayanghat-Mugling road in Chitwan district, around 100 kilometres from the capital Kathmandu.

The accident took place around 3.30 am, an official said.

While 24 people were onboard the Kathmandu-bound Angel bus, 41 other passengers were travelling on Ganpati Deluxe, which was going to Gaur from the Nepal capital.

“We are not sure of the total number because the buses could have picked up others on the road,” Chitwan district official Khimananda Bhusal told AFP.

“The river has swollen and no one else has been found yet,” he said.

Three passengers on the Ganpati Deluxe bus reportedly escaped after jumping out of the vehicle.

Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ expressed grief over the accident and issued directives for immediate search and rescue operations.

Landslides and floods have reportedly killed more than 90 people in Nepal since mid-June.

People watch the flooded Bagmati river in Kathmandu, Nepal, Saturday, July 6, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Lashing rains in Nepal causing flash floods and landslides have killed at least 14 persons across the country, with disaster teams searching for nine missing, police said on July 7.

Flooding in India, as well as in downstream Bangladesh, has also caused widespread damage and impacted millions.

“Police are working with other agencies and locals to find the missing people,” Nepalese police spokesman Dan Bahadur Karki told AFP.

Those killed and missing are in multiple locations.

Monsoon rains from June to September bring widespread death and destruction every year across South Asia, but the numbers of fatal floods and landslides have increased in recent years.

Experts say climate change and increased road construction are exacerbating the problem.

Parts of Nepal have been receiving heavy rainfall since July 4, prompting disaster authorities in the Himalayan nation to warn of flash floods in multiple rivers.

There have been reports of inundation in several districts of lowland areas bordering India.

Last month 14 persons were killed in Nepal in ferocious storms that brought landslides, lightning and flooding.

In India, floods have swamped the northeastern state of Assam, with six persons killed in the last 24 hours, Assam’s Disaster Management Authority said on July 7.

That takes the death toll from the downpours since mid-May to 58.

In low-lying Bangladesh, downstream from India, the disaster management agency said floods had impacted more than two million people.

Much of the country is made up of deltas where the Himalayan rivers the Ganges and the Brahmaputra wind towards the sea after coursing through India.

The summer monsoon brings South Asia 70-80% of its annual rainfall.

Landslides triggered by heavy rainfall on June 29 killed at least nine people including an entire family while they were sleeping in Nepal’s mountainous districts, officials said.

The landslides buried houses in three separate areas in the country’s mountainous region, about 250 kilometers (156 miles) west of the capital, Kathmandu, according to Nepal’s National Disaster Rescue and Reduction Management Authority.

Five members of the same family were killed when their house was swallowed by a landslide while they were asleep at Malika village in Gulmi district. The victims included a couple, their daughter-in-law and two grandchildren including an 8-month-old girl.

Two more people were killed in neighboring Baglung district and another two in Syangja districts, officials said.

The monsoon season that brings heavy rainfall in Nepal began earlier this month. It generally triggers landslides in the mountainous areas that cover most part of this Himalayan nation, causing deaths and damage until September.