In the months leading up to a devastating glacier collapse on the Nepal-China border that triggered a deadly flood, officials from both countries engaged in discussions aimed at improving cross-border disaster monitoring and information sharing. The flood, which struck in late August, claimed nearly 800 lives across Nepal and China and left over 3,000 people missing, marking one of the most severe natural disasters in the Himalayan region in recent years.
On May 27, a delegation of around ten Nepali officials and a dozen Chinese representatives, including experts from Tibet where the flood originated, convened in Kathmandu to address risks associated with glacial melt, floods, and related hazards. The meeting focused on expanding cooperation, including calls for comprehensive inventories of glacial lakes and hazard mapping to better anticipate future disasters.
Nepal’s experts expressed concerns that information sharing from the Chinese side had not met their expectations. Sauhdarda Joshi, a hydrologist with Nepal's Flood Forecasting Division, stated the need for advanced alerts regarding glacier movements and other early indicators of danger. Another Nepali official, Binod Parajuli, noted that while China shared precipitation forecasts, data on avalanches, water levels, landslides, and other extreme events remained limited. China reportedly began providing forecasts of heavy rain in the affected region using WeChat and email about a month before the disaster.
Chinese officials, through their foreign ministry, emphasized that cooperation in meteorology and disaster prevention has been ongoing and described the monitoring of high-altitude glacial hazards as inherently challenging. Fan Xuanmei, a Chinese geohazard expert, highlighted difficulties in detecting sudden glacier-related failures due to harsh terrain and environmental conditions. The Chinese delegation reportedly lacked the authority to formalize binding data-sharing agreements during the May meeting, leading to a commitment for further talks.
Twelve days before the flood, China’s World Meteorological Centre warned Nepal of a monsoon depression causing enhanced rainfall that could trigger secondary hazards such as landslides and flash floods. The actual flood took place on a Wednesday morning, with torrent surveillance footage capturing the rapid advance across the border in Tibet around 8:32 a.m. Nepalese authorities were alerted within half an hour, but downstream monitoring stations were quickly disabled by the floodwaters, hampering real-time data collection.
The flood’s impact included the destruction of multiple monitoring stations, damage to 19 bridges, disruption of 40 kilometers of highway, and loss of over 10% of Nepal’s power generation capacity. Villagers downstream recounted the sheer force of mud and debris that swept through their communities with little warning.
Experts point to a growing risk of such disasters in the Hindu Kush Himalayan region, which contains an extensive network of glaciers storing vast ice reserves. Climate change has intensified glacier melt and increased the frequency of extreme weather events, elevating flood and landslide risks for millions living downstream in Nepal and across South Asia.
Following the tragedy, Nepal intends to deepen collaborative research with China and pursue agreements to facilitate more timely and granular data sharing. Parajuli indicated plans to seek a protocol similar to Nepal’s existing arrangement with India, aiming for real-time updates on precipitation and river levels every ten minutes to strengthen early warning systems and enhance disaster preparedness in the future.