Kathmandu, Sep 5: The death toll from last week’s devastating floods in Nepal has crossed 1,300, as piles of dead bodies collected in different districts continue to pile up.

According to the latest data released by the Nepal Police, as many as 1,344 bodies swept away by the Bhote Koshi River had been recovered as of 8 a.m. Saturday.

The death toll could rise further, as 4,886 people, including 606 foreigners, remain out of contact following the floods that swept all before it, causing huge damage to lives and property of people across the Bhote Koshi and Trishuli river corridor in central Nepal.

A large number of those out of contact are believed to be trapped inside tunnels of 11 hydropower projects along the two river corridors as rescue efforts are underway.

On Friday, two people were rescued alive from the tunnel of the 60MW Upper Trishuli 3A project in Rasuwa district.

The Nepali government said that rescue efforts are underway to find people still out of contact, while authorities are working on body recovery, identification, and relief operations as well.

Security agencies have intensified search and rescue operations in the flood-affected areas. So far, police say 8,962 people have been rescued, including 1552 foreigners.

Authorities are also stepping up efforts to identify the recovered bodies. DNA samples have been collected from 1,260 deceased people and 1,012 relatives of the deceased, bringing the total number of samples collected to 2,272, according to the police.

Nepal Police has deployed 7,912 personnel for search, rescue and relief operations. Sixty-five police personnel have themselves been affected by the disaster, while 25 remain out of contact.

The floods have also caused extensive damage to physical infrastructure and private property along the Bhote Koshi and Trishuli river systems.

Nepal has sought international support for the restoration process of the affected areas once the phases of rescue and relief are over.

Washington, Sep 4: Families of Americans missing after devastating floods in Nepal have appealed to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio for an expanded rescue operation, asking Washington to provide helicopters, drones, satellite imagery and search teams to help locate their relatives. Those listed include people from the United States, Australia, Canada, Britain, Singapore, France and South Africa. Many of the names in the list are of Indian origin.

The families said the US State Department had told them that 90 Americans remained unaccounted for and five had been rescued after flash floods swept through Nepal’s Rasuwa district on August 26.

Many of the missing were travelling to or from Mount Kailash, the sacred pilgrimage site in Tibet, along a route through Nepal that crosses the Chinese border at Gyirong.

“We are Americans, and we are asking our government to rescue our family members now,” the families said in an August 29 letter to Rubio.

The letter was signed by relatives and friends of 57 missing people — 31 Americans and 26 people of other nationalities.

The families said their relatives had been travelling with pilgrims, guides and workers from India and several other countries when floods struck the Bhotekoshi and Trishuli valleys.

The families thanked the US Embassy in Kathmandu and Nepali soldiers and pilots involved in rescue operations but said the scale of the American response was inadequate.

“We do not doubt the good faith of the people working on this,” they wrote.

“We are telling you that the urgency of the response has not matched what 90 missing Americans require.”

The families asked Washington to formally offer Nepal US military helicopters capable of operating at high altitude, together with crews, fuel and ground support.

They also sought drones equipped with thermal and infrared cameras, technology to detect people trapped beneath debris, equipment to locate mobile phones and temporary cellular coverage over the affected valley.

Another request calls for US satellite surveillance of the corridor from Rasuwagadhi to Trishuli Bazar and Devighat, including radar imagery capable of seeing through cloud cover.

The families asked the United States to move an urban search-and-rescue team to Kathmandu so it could be deployed immediately if Nepal accepted the assistance.

They also sought greater consular support, including a liaison for each affected family, US consular officers at hospitals receiving survivors and officers closer to the rescue operation in Rasuwa.

Some missing travellers were last known to be on the Gyirong side of the Nepal-China border, according to the letter.

The families therefore asked Washington to seek consular access and information from China and coordinate rescue efforts with other governments.

“Coordinate with Australia, the United Kingdom, India, and Singapore, whose people were in the same tour groups as our relatives,” the letter said.

The American citizens listed as missing include residents of Illinois, Virginia, Texas, New York, New Jersey, California, Arizona, Florida, Michigan, Massachusetts, Maryland, Tennessee and Ohio.

Patna, Sep 4: A 12-year-old girl was killed, and four members of her family were injured after a mud house collapsed in Bihar’s Aurangabad district, police said on Friday.

The incident, which happened in Sinhudi village under the Obra police station area, triggered panic in the village after screams and cries for help alerted residents, who rushed to the spot and found the family trapped beneath the debris.

Villagers immediately launched a rescue operation and, after considerable effort, managed to pull all five family members out of the collapsed structure. However, the girl, identified as Babli Kumari, could not be saved.

Her mother, Poonam Devi, and three other children — Nandani Kumari, Rimi Kumari and Kundan Kumar — sustained serious injuries. They were rushed to Sadar Hospital in Aurangabad for treatment, where doctors declared Babli Kumari dead on arrival.

According to villagers, Poonam Devi had been sleeping in the old mud house with her four children, as they did every night, when the walls and roof suddenly collapsed, bringing down the entire room.

The incident plunged Sinhudi village into mourning, while the injured mother and children remain under treatment at the hospital.

Former MLA Rishi Yadav expressed grief over the tragedy and urged the district administration to provide the affected family with a permanent house and adequate compensation.

Obra SHO Nitish Kumar said police received information about the incident and reached the spot. He said a girl had died after being trapped under the debris, while the injured family members were admitted to Sadar Hospital for treatment.

“We have conducted the post-mortem of the dead body and handed it over to the family for the last rites,” the SHO said, adding that further investigation into the incident is underway.

He also said that the case was recommended to the district magistrate’s office for compensation.

The area has experienced heavy rainfall over the past few days, which may have weakened the structure of the mud house and possibly led to its collapse.