Chinese rescuers faced treacherous conditions on Friday as they reached the main area wiped out by a deadly mudslide at the Tibet-Nepal border to search for hundreds of missing people, state media reported.
Two days after Tibet’s border trade hub of Gyirong was pummeled by a wall of mud and debris, a team of 21 rescuers became the first to reach it in the late afternoon on Friday, state news agency Xinhua said.
Chinese President Xi Jinping chaired a meeting of top leaders about rescue operations, as the death toll in Tibet rose to five, with 558 still missing.
“There are still many hidden dangers of glaciers, ice lakes and geological disasters in the surrounding area, and rescue is facing great difficulties,” Xinhua reported the leaders as saying.
After the mudslide hit on Wednesday, a huge lake formed upstream, raising concerns that it could burst and cause further severe flooding.
But risks from that lake are “gradually decreasing,” Chinese state media reported on Friday, adding that rescue operations were “proceeding in an orderly manner.”
Authorities had earlier paused operations in the worst affected area, citing the risk of renewed flooding due to the lake water beginning to overflow, state broadcaster CCTV said.
Later, a CCTV report said water from the lake was “flowing out naturally, with the outflow discharge exceeding the inflow discharge.”
“Compared to the high water level in the early morning on August 27, the lake’s water level has dropped by around 10 meters (33 feet), and the risk is gradually decreasing,” it added.
It was not immediately clear if the lake was the same as a debris dam that Nepalese authorities warned had burst on Friday.
Family members of the missing were being housed in the area by authorities as they waited for news, one woman told AFP.
She said she had not been able to reach her relative, a police officer at Gyirong, or his wife, since the disaster happened, and had been told he was missing by his work unit.
CCTV said that 499 Chinese nationals and 555 foreigners had been transported out of the disaster zone as of Friday.
Rescue workers are using drone-based 3D modelling and thermal imaging detection, as well as manual searches, to locate those still missing, said CCTV.
Xi offered Beijing’s help in Nepal’s rescue operations, in a condolence message to the country’s president.
“China is willing to actively assist Nepal in its rescue efforts and provide support and aid to the best of its ability,” Xi said according to CCTV.
