A catastrophic flood struck the Rasuwagadhi border crossing between Nepal and Tibet, destroying much of the infrastructure at this remote Himalayan location. Video footage captured the moment a dark torrent of water, mud, boulders, and ice surged down the valley at Gyirong on the Chinese side, with satellite imagery and video fragments showing that buildings and structures that once occupied the valley floor were swept away in the disaster.
The border crossing serves as a historic travel route between Kathmandu and Tibet, where pilgrims heading to Mount Kailash, traders, truck drivers, customs officials, and tourists regularly pass through. The area is geologically vulnerable, characterized by deep gorges and steep rivers that flow at high velocity while carrying heavy sediment and large boulders. According to Nepal’s immigration records, the crossing was unusually busy on the morning of the flood, with approximately 300 to 400 people waiting to cross from Nepal into Tibet. Electronic records show that 89 Nepali and foreign nationals had cleared immigration to leave Nepal, with the final transaction recorded at 08:35, less than 10 minutes before the flood appeared on surveillance footage.
Among those who had cleared immigration were 32 Indians, 12 Chinese nationals, and nine Americans, along with citizens from Britain, Canada, Australia, and Italy. However, the immigration records capture only a partial picture of the situation. Travellers typically took 15 to 20 minutes to walk from the Nepalese immigration office to the border bridge, and some waited in the surrounding area of Ghatte Khola Bazar, which housed 50 to 60 homes, hotels, local businesses, and hydropower offices. Four immigration employees, including the head of the Rasuwagadhi office, went missing in the floods, with one body recovered downstream.
Seismic instruments detected movement in the mountains at 08:37, attributed to the collapse of part of a glacier that triggered the flood. Survivors and officials have found it difficult to determine the exact locations of all those present when the disaster struck. At least 275 Indians remain missing in Nepal according to India’s foreign ministry, and survivor estimates suggest the actual death toll in the border area could be significantly higher than official figures indicate.
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