"A disaster incomparable to our own country... we felt helpless"
"We feel sorry to the families of the missing"
The Korea Disaster Relief Team (KDRT), South Korea's rescue team, has been carrying out search and rescue operations at the site of Nepal's massive flooding. On Tuesday (local time), it focused foot and drone searches on areas that families of missing South Koreans had specifically requested, but the searches turned up nothing.
That day, KDRT members traveled with the Nepalese military aboard two helicopters to the Rasuwa district in central-northern Bagmati Province, where they attempted searches near the powerhouse of the Upper Trishuli-1 hydropower plant and the Yellow Bridge. Families of the missing had strongly requested a search of this area.
One helicopter carrying KDRT members landed in the powerhouse area that day, while the other landed at a Nepalese military base camp 6 kilometers from the powerhouse.
The team that landed near the powerhouse focused on drone searches of the surrounding area after Nepalese military officials determined the terrain was too steep for a foot search. Another team attempted a foot search along a temporary road heading upstream to look for possible evacuation points. The team stopped where the road ended and conducted a drone search for about an hour and 40 minutes.
KDRT said no specific findings related to the missing were made that day.
Cho Hyun-moon, head of KDRT's rescue headquarters at the National Fire Agency, held a briefing that afternoon at the KDRT base camp in Batar, Bagmati Province. "In this operation in Nepal, we could not help but feel a sense of helplessness in the face of a disaster whose nature is beyond comparison with our own country, and the geographical constraints on accessing the site," he said. "While we are doing our best given that South Korean nationals remain out of contact, we feel sorry and apologetic for the parts where our capabilities fall short," he added.
Meanwhile, as of that day, the death toll in Nepal alone from the massive flooding that struck the upstream Himalayan mountainous region on Aug. 26 stood at 1,357. Including 43 people killed by flood-related landslides in China's Tibet Autonomous Region near the border, the overall death toll reached 1,400.
The number of missing totals 5,845, combining 5,326 in Nepal and 519 in the Tibetan region. Among the missing are nine South Korean employees who were working on construction of the Upper Trishuli-1 hydropower plant — six from Doosan Enerbility and three from Korea South-East Power.
yeongdai@heraldcorp.com
