KATHMANDU, Aug 27: Lying on a bed in the emergency ward of Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital, 36-year-old Girilal Budhathoki stares blankly at the hospital’s white ceiling.
Deep blue bruises cover his body. His head and back are wrapped in white bandages. Injuries and dried bloodstains are still visible across his face.
When a relative or health worker comes over to ask him something, he tries to sit up. But the physical pain is not the worst of it. The shock of losing his entire family is too overwhelming, and he sinks back onto the bed.
Girilal was seriously injured while trying to escape the devastating Bhotekoshi flood that struck Timure in Rasuwa on Wednesday morning. A Nepal Army helicopter rescued him and brought him to Kathmandu in the afternoon.
His body survived. His family did not.
Girilal, originally from Salyan, had been working as a laborer in Timure, a border market in Rasuwa, for many years. He is the second of three brothers.
His home stood about 300 meters above the normal level of the Bhotekoshi River. He had never imagined that floodwaters could rise so violently that they would reach his settlement and wipe out his family.
It was a sunny Wednesday morning in Timure. The border market was already coming alive with its usual activity. At around 8 AM, Girilal had just returned to his room after taking out the garbage when he suddenly heard a tremendous roar outside.
“A terrifying surge of water, like a mass of white mist, came rushing toward us,” Girilal recalled from his hospital bed. “There was no time to think. Within moments, the flood had entered the house.”
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As the flood swept into the house, Girilal and his brother-in-law climbed onto the roof to save themselves. When they tried to jump from the roof, the raging water swept his brother-in-law away before his eyes.
Girilal jumped from the roof and managed to reach a nearby wall. But debris from the collapsing house trapped him against it.
He grabbed a tree branch growing from the wall and held on for his life. By then, he had suffered serious injuries to his head and back. Within seconds, the ground beneath him collapsed.
Then, somehow, he managed to grab the bank above him and pull himself to safety.
When he finally reached higher ground and looked back, there was nothing left to return to. His house was gone. So was his family.
The flood had swallowed his two sons, aged 13 and 15; his two daughters, aged 15 and 18; and his 35-year-old wife within moments.
About half an hour before the disaster, Girilal had called his elder brother, Yamlal Budhathoki, who had come to Kathmandu from Salyan for medical treatment. Girilal asked about his brother’s health and told him, “Brother, I will also come to Kathmandu to see you.”
Less than half an hour later, Yamlal received another call from Girilal. His voice was trembling. Crying, he said, “Brother, everything is over for us. The flood came and swept everyone away along with the house.”
Then the phone connection was cut off.
Yamlal was left stunned. When he later learned that his injured brother had been brought to Teaching Hospital by helicopter, he rushed there. He is now staying at the hospital, caring for Girilal.
According to Yamlal, he last met Girilal in Salyan in August last year, when their father died. Since then, they had spoken only by phone.
“Just a few days ago, I spoke to my youngest niece on the phone. She told me, ‘Uncle, I will come home this Dashain,’” Yamlal said, his eyes filled with tears. “The niece who said she would come home for Dashain is now gone forever. What a devastating blow from God.”
Yamlal said around 200 households lived in the settlement in Timure. Following Wednesday’s devastating flood, only around 20 to 30 people are believed to have survived.
Girilal is not the only survivor carrying the trauma of what happened.
Karma Shrestha, also from Timure, is receiving treatment in the emergency ward of Teaching Hospital. She too survived after fleeing when the flood swept away both her parents.
She witnessed her father and mother being carried away by the flood before her eyes. She is now suffering severe psychological trauma and is unable to speak.
Meanwhile, the Teaching Hospital premises have become a place of anguish for families searching for relatives who were lost or remain missing in Rasuwa.
Yamchu Tamang of Timure arrived at the hospital on Wednesday evening searching for her sister, brother-in-law and other relatives. But after failing to find their names on the list of injured patients, she broke down in tears.
“We have been visiting hospitals across Kathmandu since early morning, but there is still no sign of them,” Yamchu said, wiping away her tears. “The helicopters involved in the rescue seem to have brought only those they could find in accessible places. Our people are trapped in landslides. They need to be searched for and rescued as soon as possible.”
According to the Health Emergency Operation Center under the Ministry of Health and Food Safety, injured people rescued from the flood-affected areas are receiving treatment at various hospitals in the Kathmandu Valley.
Kali Prasad Rosayara, information officer at Teaching Hospital, said most of the injured admitted to the hospital were brought in covered in mud and suffering from serious injuries.
Seventeen injured people are receiving treatment at Teaching Hospital. They include 34-year-old Tej Bahadur Tamang of Timure, Rasuwa; 48-year-old Pema Tamang; 25-year-old Kushal Magar; 40-year-old A. Karki; 27-year-old Rajendra Bhatta; 32-year-old Min Bahadur Tamang; 36-year-old Girilal Budhathoki; 35-year-old Sujan Basnet; 23-year-old Rohan Shrestha; 50-year-old Bal Bahadur Gharti; 30-year-old Ashok Shrestha; 28-year-old Karma Yonjan Nagarkoti; and 22-year-old Suruchi Rana Magar.
Similarly, 20-year-old Rita Dolcha and 35-year-old Rita Dochach of Dolakha, Ram Prasad Tharu and an unidentified man are also receiving treatment at the hospital.
At the National Trauma Center in Kathmandu, four people from Bidur, Nuwakot—Bhakta Bhandari, Sita Bhandari, Bibek Kumal and Rihana Lamichhane—are receiving treatment. Dawa Dolma of Gosainkunda, Rasuwa, is being treated at Birendra Army Hospital in Chhauni.
According to Dr Samir Kumar Adhikari, joint spokesperson for the Ministry of Health and Population, six major “hub” hospitals in the Kathmandu Valley have been kept on standby to provide emergency treatment to those injured in the Rasuwa floods.
They are Bir Hospital, National Trauma Center, Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital in Maharajgunj, Patan Academy of Health Sciences, Civil Service Hospital and Birendra Army Hospital in Chhauni.
