KATHMANDU: Rescuers in Nepal pulled alive a Chinese national from a tunnel and a local woman from her partially submerged home on Saturday, as emergency teams searched with fresh urgency for thousands missing since catastrophic flooding 10 days ago.
A team comprising personnel from the Nepal Army and foreign experts rescued the Chinese man from 225 metres (738 feet) inside the tunnel of the Upper Trishuli-1 Hydropower Project in Rasuwa district, a military statement said.
Communitiesintheworst-affecteddistrictsremained cut off after the floods tore through mountains, destroying roads and bridges. On Saturday, the Nepalese government released a provisional damage assessment, saying more than 7,500 houses, 48 public buildings and about 100 bridges had been destroyed.
According to the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA), at least 12 to 13 operational hydropower plants were severely damaged or entirely destroyed, knocking out roughly 431 megawatts more than 10pc of the country’stotalpowergenerationcapacity.Furthermore, 15 additional projects currently under construction (totaling 470 MW) sustained extensive damage.
Authorities later in the day said members of Nepal’s Armed Police Force had pulled Chandrika Shrestha, 64, alive from her buried home in Nuwakot district. ‘A police team found her as they were clearing the area.
She has been airlifted to Kathmandu for treatment, police deputy superintendent Iqbal Hawari said.
A video released by the police force showed only part of her house visible, with the lower floors submerged by thick sludge. Prime Minister Balendra Shah said Shrestha’s rescue ‘has given hope to the entire nation’.
‘Hope and responsibility’ The energy ministry said rescuers were planning to use customised drones provided by Switzerland to assist in the tunnel search operations. The drones are specifically designed to conduct search and inspection operations inside dark, narrow and hazardous tunnels.
‘Our priority right now is... to continue the rescue efforts, keep all possible options open, and move forward with hope and responsibility,’ Energy Minister Biraj Bhakta Shrestha said on social media.
On Friday, two Nepali hydropower workers were rescued at the Trishuli 3A tunnel, where searches continued alongside multiple other sites, with at least 12 hydropower projects destroyed by the floods. Both men were reported to be in stable condition in a Kathmandu hospital.
The government initially said it believed more than 100 workers could be alive inside multiple tunnels.
Experts from India, China, Australia and South Korea have been aiding Nepali rescuers in their search for survivors in the blocked tunnels.
So far 1,331 bodies have been recovered in Nepal, the national disaster agency said, revising an earlier figure of 1,344. Around 5,000 people remain missing in the country.
Chinese state media said 31 people had been killed and 531 were missing in Tibet.-Agencies