Nepal flood death toll reaches 675 as 2,418 remain missing and a new lake builds upstream

Nepal Police said Saturday evening that 675 bodies have been recovered from the Bhote Koshi and Trishuli flood. The National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority put the missing list at 2,418 as of 6:30 p.m. The numbers keep moving because search teams are still reaching settlements that were cut off on Wednesday morning.

Chitwan recorded the highest count of recovered bodies, 246. Nawalparasi East followed with 165, then Nawalparasi West with 63, Gorkha with 57, Nuwakot with 51, Dhading with 45, Tanahun with 35 and Rasuwa with 13. Medical teams have treated or discharged 219 injured people. The Red Cross has said as many as 93,000 people may have been affected.

The missing roster is as grim as the death list. NDRRMA said it includes 933 workers from underground hydropower projects, 589 foreign citizens and 127 Nepalis who were travelling with tourist groups. Another 104 security and government staff remain unaccounted for: 45 from the Nepal Army, 27 from Nepal Police, 15 customs officers, 13 from the Armed Police Force and four immigration staff. Rasuwa alone accounts for 562 of the missing names.

What happened on Wednesday morning

The flood entered Nepal from the Tibet Autonomous Region around 9 a.m. on 26 August and ran down the Bhote Koshi into the Trishuli system. There was little rain at the time in Rasuwa, which is why hydrologists have focused on an ice-and-rock collapse on a tributary, the Lhende Khola, rather than a conventional monsoon cloudburst.

Satellite images shared through the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development showed a debris dam forming about 20 kilometres upstream of the Miteri Bridge. The dam then failed. A later avalanche dumped an estimated 50,000 cubic metres of ice. A second, larger lake with no visible outlet has since been watched from both sides of the border. Chinese authorities have warned that continued rain could push inflows of around three million cubic metres over three days.

The United States Geological Survey logged a magnitude-4.4 signal at 8:37 a.m. local time shortly before the surge. Scientists have treated that reading as a possible collapse signature rather than a conventional tectonic quake. Nepal's Department of Hydrology and Meteorology has not issued a final official cause.

Roads, tunnels and the pilgrimage route

The Department of Roads said the 42-kilometre stretch from Betrawati in Nuwakot to the Rasuwagadhi border crossing was destroyed at several points, including concrete bridges. A further 16 kilometres toward the border, upgraded with Chinese financing, was also swept away. That corridor is Nepal's main overland trade and pilgrimage route to Tibet and to Mount Kailash.

Nine commercial bank branches were washed out, with 26 staff listed as missing. The Rasuwa customs office in Timure lost contact with 15 employees. Hydropower tunnels became traps. An 11-member Indian technical team surveyed those tunnels on Saturday before moving to Trishuli to help workers still inside a project gallery. Local officials have said more than 100 people remained trapped at one site after about 350 were brought out.

More than 15,000 security personnel have been deployed. Helicopters have flown repeated sorties when weather allowed. Fresh rain on Saturday raised the Bhotekoshi again and slowed some of those flights. India said seven bodies had been recovered from rivers flowing out of Nepal into its territory.

Foreign nationals and India's count

At least 261 foreign tourists who had gone out of contact have been rescued, according to Nepalese officials. That group included 167 Indians, 40 Chinese, eight Ukrainians, four each from Germany and Malta, and three from the United States. Others came from Turkey, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Switzerland, Italy, Oman, Belgium and Bulgaria.

India's Ministry of External Affairs has used a different ledger. Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said 320 Indian nationals in Nepal remained uncontactable on Friday, up from 290 earlier, plus about 100 people of Indian origin holding other passports. India had not confirmed deaths by Friday evening and said it was still seeking clarity from Kathmandu. MEA also said 149 Indians crossed from Tibet into Nepal on Friday and that around 400 more were safe on the Chinese side.

A 21-member Kailash Mansarovar group from Tamil Nadu reached Delhi on Friday after being brought to Kathmandu the night before. Eight people from Kerala were among those still listed as missing in earlier state tallies. Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah to intensify the search for Indians and to send more rescue capacity.

On the Chinese side, Xinhua reported seven dead and more than 550 missing, with 555 stranded tourists and 499 residents evacuated. Those figures sit beside Nepal's larger lists and are not a single combined census.

Aid and the next surge

Kathmandu first said it would not take international search teams, then reversed that position under pressure from governments whose citizens were on the missing lists. Foreign specialists have been invited for limited tasks. India has offered further help. The United Nations children's agency has warned that thousands of children need urgent assistance as families are split across relief barracks.

The immediate risk is another pulse of water. Police issued a fresh alert after the upstream lake grew. Rescuers in Nuwakot and Rasuwa have had to pull back from riverbanks when levels rise, then go back in when they fall. Bodies are still being found far downstream of the original collapse, which is why Chitwan, hours away by ordinary road, now holds the largest mortuary count.

The next 72 hours will decide whether Saturday's 675 becomes a plateau or another step up the list. The second lake has no mapped outlet. That is the number search teams are watching as closely as the missing roster.