38 confirmed dead, 400 rescued in series of blizzard and avalanches
No matter how far the human race has come, and no matter how advanced we may think we are as a species, there is one undeniable fact about life on earth: that nature is king on planet earth, and we are forever at the mercy of its indifference and raw power. This manifests itself every so often, whether in the form of a tropical storm, a devastating earthquake, or merely a fit of rain on someone’s wedding day.
October’s events in Nepal have been a sad yet reinforcing illustration of this very fact. A series of freak blizzards and avalanches have left at least 40 people dead – including four Canadians – and have resulted in nearly 400 emergency rescues along the popular Annapurna trekking route in what is being called the country’s worst-ever trekking disaster.
As of Monday, Oct. 20, rescue operations in Nepal’s northern mountains have been officially called off, with Nepalese officials stating that all the hikers believed to have been stranded on a trekking route in the region are now safe and out of harm’s way. The search to locate the remaining bodies of the deceased, however, will continue to take place intermittently.
Nepalese officials have also been forced to close a section of the trekking circuit because of the intrusion of hiking groups and tourists, who have begun flocking the area now that the weather has cleared. October is generally one of the region’s most popular trekking seasons, and so it remains to be seen what effect such a disaster will have ultimately have on Nepal, whose main source of income is the climbing tourism industry.
The weather events are said to have been triggered by the tail end of a cyclone that hit the Indian coast days before heading north to Nepal, where tourists were caught off guard by sudden and unrelenting changes in weather and forced to seek refuge or create their own makeshift shelters.
Gombu Sherpa, a local guide who was leading a group of German climbers during the outbreak of the storm, said that skies were clear at the beginning of the week, and that guides had no idea that such oppressive weather was on the way. Days later, however, the weather took a turn for the worse.
“We could hardly see anyone, even within a couple of feet. The wind was blowing snow and visibility was almost zero,” said Sherpa in a telephone interview after returning by bus to Kathmandu. While everyone in Sherpa’s group was able to survive the ordeal in an abandoned tea hut, many other climbers and guides were not so lucky, as whiteout conditions and sweeping avalanches made survival a harrowing task.
Linor Kajan, one of the almost 400 who was rescued over a four-day period, was caught in one of the region’s sudden avalanches and described believing “she was going to die,” as she was unable to move until a Nepalese guide spotted her and dragged her to safety.
Most of the casualties were among those caught on the Thorong La pass, one of the highest points in the area, which made rescue even by helicopter nearly impossible. So far, 34 bodies have been identified, which are said to include climbers from Canada, India, Israel, Slovakia, Poland, and Japan, as well as Nepalese guides. Most of the bodies have been flown to nearby towns for autopsies.