A newly married British man has expressed deep anguish after the home where his wife and several family members were staying was destroyed in devastating floods in Nepal. The disaster, triggered by a glacier collapse last Wednesday, has so far claimed more than 1,000 lives, with around 4,000 people still reported missing.

Pramod Poudel, 34, from Uckfield, East Sussex, arrived in Nepal on Friday to search for his wife, Sumitra, 25, and other relatives believed to have been in the village of Sole Bazaar. After hiking 11 hours through the Himalayas, Poudel found that all bridges over the Trishuli River had been destroyed, blocking access to his family’s home. “Where my house was, there is a large hole. There is nothing left,” he said, describing a landslide that swept away about 90 percent of the village’s residents.

Poudel said his mother, Tulisa, 52, his brother Pardip, 31, his uncle Madhav, 64, and his wife remain among 56 missing residents out of around 150 in Sole Bazaar. “I was speaking to my wife just minutes before the flood,” he recalled. “At the end of the call she said, ‘I miss you so much.’ My hope is diminishing. I have lost my mother, my brother, my wife, and my uncle. The land I had here has gone. I have nothing.”

Efforts to provide assistance have faced challenges, including difficulties in communication and access. Poudel said he contacted the British embassy in Kathmandu prior to leaving for the village but had not received any response. The UK Foreign Office stated that its staff are “working around the clock” to support British nationals and their families affected by the floods. The British foreign secretary updated Parliament yesterday, revising the number of British tourists missing in Nepal to 36.

The Nepalese government has been working to manage the growing crisis, though some measures have sparked controversy. With mortuaries overwhelmed by the number of victims, authorities have begun interring unidentified bodies in mass graves near Kathmandu’s Gokarna Community Forest, adjacent to a golf course about five miles from the city center. Soldiers have been transporting bodies, contained in protective white bags, to six-foot-deep pits dug by excavators. This approach has drawn criticism as many Nepali families traditionally prefer to cremate their deceased on funeral pyres.

Rescue and recovery operations continue amid ongoing concerns about missing people and the scale of destruction caused by the glacier collapse and resulting floods. The full impact of the disaster remains uncertain as officials and families alike await news of loved ones.