Nepal floods | NDTV aerial report: Nepal villages buried or swept away by floodwaters

Well, you've just seen the damage to roads, to bridges and infrastructure from the air. Vishnu now joins us live from Kathmandu this morning. Vishnu, you've now had a chance to see some of the worst affected areas from the air. Tell us what is the one thing though that these photographs and official numbers still don't quite convey about the scale of this disaster? Well, as you know, Parmeshwar, for the last several days, before this helicopter sortie, we've been reporting on the ground from some of the worst hit areas, Bidur, Devi Ghat, Trishuli, and several other areas. And we've had teams of NDTV correspondents spread out to the Rasuwa district as well, my colleague Siktha Deo, our colleague Siktha Deo. But there has always been buildings which you see destroyed. You've seen families over there. But on the helicopter sortie, what I noticed is as we went upstream, there were large areas where there was absolutely nothing. Had you not known that those were populated areas, you would have just thought that this is just a part of the valley where there is nothing, there's been no construction. It was for the helicopter pilot, who an experienced ex-retired colonel of the Nepali army to tell us that no, look, you know, the area we were flying over, you can't see anything because there's nothing there now, but just last week, it was fully populated and inhabited. Therefore, the fact that, you know, the boulders, the mud, and everything else coming down the Trishuli river valley was coming down at a speed of 200 plus kilometers per hour, that's what experts say, was strong enough to actually wipe out entire settlements. There were certain settlements which were on the hill and those homes were fine, and then large mud banks beneath them, right on the banks of the river where there was absolutely nothing. Had you not known that that used to be an area where people used to live, you would have just thought that it is a mud bank. When we finally flew as north as we could, we were just a few hundred meters away from the border between Nepal and China. That was the Rasuagadi port. That's where the impact was first felt. There's absolutely nothing. There's hardly a small tiny cement structure that you can spot. But what we did see are perhaps the first elements of the Chinese forces, perhaps their advanced teams coming over there to try and help them start the digging operations. So for me, the question is this, Is everything, the buildings, are they under the mud or have they been completely destroyed and washed downstream? Vishnu, absolutely devastating imagery emerging out of Nepal, heartbreaking stories as well. We know as we speak, thousands are still missing, hundreds of hydropower workers were given to understand they're still unaccounted for, but tell us on the ground, does it feel as though the search is still an active search for survivors or are teams increasingly moving into a recovery operation? You know, Parameshwar, that is really the question at this stage, because it's now been so many days that if contact is not made soon with those workers trapped across various run-of-the-river heidel projects, people, and there are hundreds who are believed to still be trapped inside those tunnels, then it's going to be very, very difficult. Given the depth of the mud, you know, I mean, and physically getting through to those areas, experts from India, from Nepal primarily, some Chinese are struggling to actually make contact. As of 4pm yesterday, there was no contact which has been made but there is elaborate infrastructure underneath, you know, and subterranean. And therefore that is what needs to be accessed. So we did, as you saw in that report, get to Trisul-E3, that's where they are digging. But again, it's going to be very difficult, it could take even more time. We are at a certain level hoping for a miracle and so therefore let's all keep our hope alive, our faith intact to ensure, to hope that there are people who make it out alive. Disaster zone is not very far as it were, by air it's just about 15 odd minutes. Remember it's not just about the loss of lives, it's also about rebuilding Nepal and certainly this valley. You can take a look at the Trishuli river and the flow of river from this side in the direction of China. There were a lot of homes over here as well and these are completely Within minutes, the green ridges of the Kathmandu valley disappear behind us. And then below the full scale of Nepal's devastation comes into view. From the air, there is nowhere to hide from the destruction. The Trishuli River, once a winding lifeline through these Himalayan valleys, has become a vast black corridor of destruction. We will be crossing a ridgeline not too far away from Kathmandu airport. fact the disaster zone is not very far as it were by air it's just about 15 odd minutes. We are crossing a heavy ridgeline now we are going to be descending into the valley where the damage has taken place. The idea of getting onto a helicopter to try and get to these areas is to try and ensure that our viewers get a real idea of what the extent of the tragedy is. So what we are going to be doing is go up the Trishuli valley to some of the areas which have been badly hit to again try and understand what the situation presently is. Remember it's been quite a few days since this disaster has taken place what we now need to try and find out is what the extent of the damage is and certainly get a perspective of the levels from the air of the river underneath. For kilometers, the landscape is scarred by mud, shattered rock, uprooted trees and debris. Roads disappear into the river. Bridges are gone. Homes and settlements have been ripped apart. Entire stretches of highway have been swallowed by the mountainside. What looks from the ground like isolated pockets of destruction reveals itself from above as something much bigger, a continuous trail of devastation cutting through the heart of the Himalayas. We follow that trail north. The closer we get to the Trishuli Corridor, the more the scale becomes impossible to comprehend. At Bidur, the river has eaten deep into the banks. Roads that once ran alongside the water have been torn away. stand precariously above freshly hollowed earth. Farmland has vanished behind layers of mud and debris. And then, below us, the Trishuli 3A and 3B project sites. One of the sites where there are rescue operations which are now taking place, the Nepalese army is over here. They are involved in these rescue operations. It's particularly challenging over here. But we're going to head up to that area to try and see what exactly is taking place over here. Ashwini, if you can turn the camera around so that I can actually show our viewers of the extent of everything that's taking place over here. And follow me as we actually come and take a look at what's happening ahead. They are digging at this particular site but again whether they'll be able to find anybody at this stage we don't know. That is the site which is actually blocked and this is where they're trying to get. So digging into this entire hillside is what they're doing with these JCB machines. These are some of the tunnels that you can see on your screen which have been blocked. The goal is ultimately to try and see if there's anybody alive in this area. But that's what the situation over here at the moment is. Massive concrete structures are dwarfed by the landscape around them. Tunnel portals appear as dark cavernous openings, partially submerged, choked with silt and debris. Deep inside these subterranean networks, hundreds of workers were caught as the floodwaters surged through the valley. We are going to excavate for making a trench so that water and mud can flow from here and we can enter up to the place where they are sitting there. And how is every minute absolutely critical in an operation like this because time is not in your side? Yeah, so we are trying best. How many people do you have deployed over here? Yeah, we have more than 90 people here. And they are working through the day and night? Yeah, day and night, yeah. And how, right, and are you concerned about another flood because that's not been ruled out at the moment? Yeah, but we cannot, we are not sure, but probably the flood is not coming again, yeah. Are you, is everybody over here with the Nepali army or are there other experts? Yes, all Nepali, yeah. there you have it a geotechnical expert telling us a little bit about what they're trying to do right over here get to these sites dig through because all of this mud and debris has flowed in when the rivers actually the river was in spade the Trishuli we're going to actually walk to the edge right now and give you an idea of this particular location everything that I'm standing on now has been and it's an area which has been completely all of this is is mud it's sediment almost all of it actually came into this particular area it's much much higher than what it normally was but let's just come over here to the edge so that you can take a look at the Trishuli river and the flow of river from this side so that is the in the direction of China right and the river flew came all the way down right across the bank and then it turned over here and Trishuli town itself is further over there. We're going to move on now and move to the next site and take a look at what exactly has taken place. And the destruction does not end here. We follow the river deeper into the gorge towards Betravoti. From above, the pattern repeats. Settlements erased, roads broken, farmland buried, the river carving a new path through everything in its way. At Dharapani and Ghumti Bazar, entire sections of the highway have simply ceased to exist. The mountains themselves appear to have been torn out of this is suburb a seat this is one of the areas very badly affected to my left over here they were all homes the extent of damage over here much more than what we've seen in trishuli approximately 65 percent of homes over here at least have been destroyed so if you just come back to me over here ashwini what i can do is we can actually this the Bhotekoshi river now it used to be Trishuli downstream it's now the Bhotekoshi and we are now flying north in the direction of the border with China and there are many other run-of-the-river projects over here to generate electricity, hydropower projects so which in fact there's one over there yeah Right, so these are all hydropower projects over here and this is where the river was actually flowing at about 200 plus kilometers an hour and that's what was repeatedly stated, was repeatedly said, about 200 kilometers an hour is what the river was flowing down over here. We just flew over Siprobisi, as you could see, 65% of the town was destroyed but there There are power projects over here, very badly hit. We push further north to a region vulnerable to landslides and then below us, Timore, or what remains of it. From the air, the scale is staggering. This was a border town, a customs complex, a vital trading gateway between Nepal and China. Now much of it is buried beneath vast field of grey slurry. Multi-storey buildings are submerged deep in mud. Steel is twisted and exposed. It has been completely destroyed. There is absolutely nothing there at all. So that's what the damage over here is. And the key point is that even over here, there were plenty of homes, there were structures, all of that has been washed away. 100% is what the Colonel flying the helicopter tells me. This is the first look that we saw by helicopter of the exact spot where the floods broke through right from China into Nepal and everything there is 100% damage over here. We are not flying over a normal sort of barren valley. There were a lot of there were a lot of homes over here as well and these are completely destroyed. And finally Rasuagadi, the historic northern gateway, the international bridge that once connected two countries is gone. In its place a violent frothing chasm cuts through the valley. The border post has been obliterated. From Kathmandu to the China border what we are seeing from the air is not a series of isolated disasters. It's a corridor of destruction stretching for nearly a hundred kilometers. The aerial view reveals what the ground cannot. sheer scale of what has been lost. An entire landscape has been transformed. And as a helicopter turns back towards Kathmandu, the devastation continues to stretch into the distance. our program over the last several days over here in Nepal. Our effort has been to try and bring you a viewer a true sense of what it is that people over here have suffered. As we end this particular sorting, the thought that crosses my mind is the uncertainty of it all. There are thousands who are missing over here. The number of people who have lost their lives will go up substantially. More than 4,000 people are missing over here. The death toll will be in the thousands, is my sense. For families who are still waiting, the wait and the pain is agonizing. They'll never know if their loved ones will ever get back. But as every hour passes, as every minute goes by, the sense that that reality, that they may never see their loved ones, is something that will be coming home to all of them. But But also think about the enormous economic loss that Nepal has faced. All of these run-of-the-river projects will need to be fixed, or repaired, or entirely rebuilt. And that's something which is going to take a lot of time, and perhaps millions of dollars. The people of Nepal have acquired resilience. They are people who are dignified, are solid as they grieve, and in this hour of need, They stand firm to try and ensure that they deal with this horrific tragedy. With Ashwini and Malokia, Vishnu Show for NET.