A rescue operation to recover 12 people missing at Himlung peak of Nepal following an avalanche has been temporarily suspended due to bad weather conditions, a mountaineering guide association said.
The avalanche swept away the base camp of the Himlung Himal, a 7,126m peak in the Nar Phu area of Manang district close to China’s Tibet border on Sunday, burying 16 Nepali workers.
Four people have been confirmed dead with their bodies recovered while 12 people who were preparing for later expeditions on the peak remain missing.
Volunteer rescue workers organised by the Nepal National Mountain Guides Association (NNMGA) on Tuesday said their search through 14ft of snow covering the base camp area has posed dire conditions.
“The rescue operation has been temporarily paused because of the prevailing mountain conditions,” it said.
It said the heavy snow has made “manual searching extremely difficult due to deep snow, freezing temperatures, and unstable conditions”.
The rescue operation was being led by Mingma Gyalje Sherpa, who was also part of the search operation to recover the bodies of 10 climbers, including his friend Nirmal Purja, after they were all killed in the 30 July avalanche.
The sherpa, who is leading a team of eight guides, told AFP that he had little hope of finding those missing alive.
"Looking at the bodies recovered, it would be impossible for the rest to survive," he said. "The scale of the avalanche is massive, we can go back when the snow melts a bit."
He said they dug through 13ft of snow after they reached the base camp on Sunday evening, finding two mountain guides on Sunday, and two of the kitchen staff on Monday.
The 12 missing people at the base camp are kitchen staff who were part of the team preparing for expeditions.
Persistent rainfall and snow in mountainous areas in recent days have created treacherous conditions for Nepal’s climbing tourism industry this season.
The incident comes a month after a catastrophic flash flood following a glacial collapse killed 1400 people and left some 6,000 missing.
The latest bout of bad weather killed 21 people after heavy rain triggered floods and landslides across Nepal between 24 and 28 September.
A few days ago, climbers were forced to leave Mount Manaslu, the world's eighth-highest peak, because of the rising threat of avalanches.
Extreme weather has affected much of Asia in the past week.
