Fears of more flooding in Nepal, 100 Americans among the missing as rescue efforts step up

KATHMANDU, Nepal — Authorities in Nepal have warned of the risk of further flooding after heavy rain, as China sheds light on the scale of the disaster in its Tibet region.

Five days after surging floodwaters from a glacier collapse buried communities across the region in thick mud, rescuers in Nepal were still struggling to reach devastated communities as the full scale of the destruction emerged.

“The disaster here is overwhelming,” Ferrin Cole, an operations director at the U.S.-based Crisis Response International, told NBC News on Sunday. “The flood that came down that mountain just wiped out cities. We’re going in as fast as we can to get people the help that they need.”

Cole said that his team would be working to help locate missing people but that working in mud “is actually pretty dangerous.”

“The longer that death and mud are together, diseases breed, and so we’re always just aware of that,” he added.

Approximately 100 Americans are among the missing across Nepal and China’s Tibet region, the State Department said Saturday.

How did the catastrophic Nepal-Tibet flood happen?

In Nepal, the death toll has risen to 781, with over 2,500 people still missing, including 592 foreign nationals…

Original source: https://www.nbcnews.com/world