Woman survives 10 days buried under debris after Nepal floods

A 60-year-old woman was rescued alive from a house buried under flood debris in Nepal’s Nuwakot district, 10 days after devastating floods swept through the Bhotekoshi river basin. Her survival has renewed hopes for others still reported missing

Nuwakot (Nepal): “We had previously searched and conducted rescue operations at this exact spot and heard no sound at all.”

The words of Armed Police Force (APF) Inspector Suman Bik, quoted by the Kantipur online portal, capture the extraordinary circumstances in which a 60-year-old woman was found alive on Saturday — 10 days after floods swept through Nepal’s Bhotekoshi river basin, killing more than 1,300 people and leaving around 5,000 missing.

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Chandika Shrestha of Betrawati in Bidur Municipality of Nuwakot district was found on the top floor of a four-storey house that had been buried under flood debris.

Her rescue has renewed hopes that other people reported missing after the August 26 disaster could still be alive, even as search teams continue to comb through buried houses and vast areas of mud and debris.

Shrestha had gone missing along with members of her family when the floods struck, Kantipur reported. After days without finding her, her family began funeral rites, believing that she had died.

But on Saturday, an APF team in the Betrawati area heard a faint voice near the buried house while passing the area again, according to Bik. The team had searched the location earlier but had heard nothing at the time.

The rescuers cleared mud from around the structure and broke through a window to enter, Bik said. As the team crawled inside, Shrestha began speaking more clearly, he said.

Bik told the Onlinekhabar news portal that Shrestha was found with about half of her body buried in mud, with only part of her body and her head visible. The rescue took around 40 to 45 minutes, he said.

Shrestha was taken out and flown to Kathmandu by a Nepali Army helicopter. She is receiving treatment at Birendra Military Hospital in Chhauni, according to Kantipur.

The flood had shifted the house from its original location and buried most of the structure in mud, according to rescue officials quoted by The Kathmandu Post. The newspaper reported that three-and-a-half storeys were completely buried and half of the fourth storey was submerged in mud.

Shrestha’s husband, Anandlal Shrestha, remains missing, while other members of the family are also unaccounted for, Kantipur reported.