Sikkim floods updates: Death toll rises to 27, 103 people remain untraceable

Death toll in Sikkim flood touched 27 on Friday. While inclement weather affected rescue operations in Sikkim on Friday - three days after flash floods destroyed human habitations, army camps and hydel power projects when a glacial lake at south Lhonak overflowed following torrential rain – the death toll touched 27 and 103 people remained untraceable, officials said.

At least 26 students from Meghalaya are stranded in Sikkim after the flash flood cut off roads and bridges in the Himalayan state, officials said on Friday.

To help those stranded in Sikkim, the Meghalaya government activated a helpline -- 1800 345 3644, they said.

"31 students from Meghalaya are studying in Sikkim. Five of them have returned on their own, while efforts are on to bring the remaining 26 back home," an official told PTI.

In the recent flash flood, 68 persons were stranded at the height of 16000 feet, totally cut off for the last 3 days in North Sikkim. ITBP rescue team launched a massive rescue operation and evacuated all 68 persons safely. In another rescue operation 6 officials of Teesta Power Project, Chungtham were also safely rescued, said the Indo Tibetan Border Police.

The death toll in the Sikkim flash flood disaster has risen to 25, officials said on Friday, as the Army mounted a massive operation using helicopters to provide relief to thousands stranded in the deluge. The flash flood struck the tiny state on Wednesday because of the possible bursting of a high-altitude glacial lake near the China, Nepal border. The deceased include at least seven Army personnel. Read More

Sikkim Chief Minister Prem Singh Tamang on Friday said that the Himalayan state has incurred damages worth thousands of crores of rupees in the flash flood, but added that the exact details will be known after a committee is formed and completes its analysis, reports PTI.

“Our first priority is to save those who are stranded and provide them immediate relief,” Tamang said.

The death toll in the Sikkim flash flood disaster has risen to 22, officials said on Friday, as the Army mounted a massive operation using helicopters to provide relief to thousands stranded in the deluge.

The Defence PRO, Guwahati, said on Friday that military equipment including firearms, explosives had been washed away by the Teesta river. It warned the people to report unfamiliar objects in and around the river. Read more here.

Several people have died in flash floods inundating India's northeast, officials said Friday, as army teams plotted helicopter rescues for more of the thousands stranded in the deluge.

Violent torrents stuck the remote state of Sikkim on Wednesday after the sudden bursting of a high-altitude glacial lake near India's borders with China and Nepal.

Climate scientists warn that similar disasters will become an increasing danger across the Himalayas as global temperatures rise and ice melts.

Downstream search-and-rescue teams recovered more bodies overnight as the waters cut a swathe through the countryside towards the Bay of Bengal.

AFP

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: All government and private schools, colleges and universities in Sikkim will remain closed till October 15 due to the prevalence of inclement weather, according to a revised circular by the state Education Department on Thursday.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: In the early hours of October 4, due to the incidents GLOF, cloudburst and flash floods, there was a sudden surge in the water flow in the Teesta river, which washed away several bridges, parts of National Highway-10 and the Chungthang dam. It has impacted several small towns and infrastructure projects in the upper reaches of the river valley in Sikkim.

• The situation in Sikkim is being closely monitored by the Centre at the highest level on a 24x7 basis.
• The Centre is providing full support to the Sikkim government by mobilising timely logistics resources to supplement its efforts to deal with the situation effectively.
• The logistics support provided includes the deployment of adequate teams of the NDRF, Indian Air Force helicopters and Army personnel, along with necessary search-and-rescue equipment.
• Further, technical teams from the ministries of power, telecommunications and roads, highways and transport are assisting for a timely restoration of the damaged infrastructure and communication network in the state, the statement said.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: Union Home Minister Amit Shah has approved the release of ₹44.8 crore as an advance amount from the central share of the State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) to Sikkim to provide relief to flash floods-affected people.

• Following a directive from Shah, the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has formed an Inter-Ministerial Central Team (IMCT), which will visit the affected areas of Sikkim soon to make an assessment of the damage caused due to a Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF), cloudburst and flash floods, according to an official statement.
• The home minister has approved the release of both the instalments of the SDRF's central share to Sikkim, amounting to ₹44.8 crore, in advance for 2023-24 to help the northeastern state provide relief to the affected people, the statement said.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has constituted an Inter-Ministerial Central Team (IMCT) to assess damages caused due to a Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) leading to a surge in flows in the Teesta River causing flash flood in Sikkim on October 4.

• Union Home Minister Amit Shah has also approved the release of both the instalments of Central Share of State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) to Sikkim, amounting to ₹44.80 crore in advance, for the year 2023-24, to help Sikkim in providing relief measures to the affected people, MHA said in a statement.
• "The Inter-Ministerial Central Team (IMCT) will visit the affected areas of Sikkim shortly. Based on the assessment of IMCT, further additional Central assistance from the National Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) to Sikkim will be approved, as per laid down procedure," said the statement.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: Multiple government agencies and scientific expeditions red-flagged the vulnerability of Lhonak Lake in North Sikkim to a glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) for at least a last decade, documents accessed by HT show. On Wednesday, flash floods that originated from the lake coursed through the river Teesta, causing widespread damage downstream, destroying the 1,200 MW Teesta Urja dam, and leaving at least 11 dead and over 120 people missing.
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Sikkim floods LIVE updates: As climate change warms high mountain regions, many communities are facing dangerous glacial lake outburst floods (GLOFs). Lakes holding water from melted glaciers can overfill and burst, sending torrents rushing down mountain valleys.

More than 200 such lakes now pose a very high hazard to Himalayan communities in India, Pakistan, China, Nepal and Bhutan, according to 2022 research.

In recent years, glacial flood early warning systems have been deployed in China, Nepal, Pakistan, and Bhutan. The early warning systems at Lhonak Lake, and another at nearby Shako Cho in Sikkim, were to be among the first in India for glacial lake outburst floods, sources told Reuters.

Scientists have for years said the two lakes are at risk of outburst floods, but the design process and search for funding caused time to pass without progress.

The death toll in the flash floods that tore through Sikkim and parts of West Bengal rose to 21 on Thursday, and 98 people were still missing, according to officials who said rescue teams were mounting frenetic operations amid cut-off roads, uprooted bridges, interrupted communication, and heavy rainfall.

On Wednesday, the river Teesta that flows through Sikkim ripped through large swathes of the hill state due to a glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) in Lhonak lake. The worst-hit districts were nearly snapped from the rest of the country, with the raging waters knocking out access as well as communications, after cleaving through a hydroelectric dam.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: The Indian army said Friday it is planning to evacuate nearly 1,500 stranded tourists using helicopters as weather in the region improves.

Approximately 3,000 tourists, including foreigners, are stranded in various parts of Sikkim, and NH-10, the key road connecting the state to the rest of India, has also suffered damage.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: At least two persons were killed and four others injured in West Bengal's Jalpaiguri district as a mortar shell, reportedly carried by the floodwaters of Teesta river, exploded, police said on Friday.

Police believe that the mortar shell belonged to the Army and was carried by floodwaters flowing down the hills following the cloudburst and flash floods in Sikkim on Wednesday.

Local police sources said the incident took place in Chapadanga village in Kranti block on Thursday when one person took the mortar shell home to sell it as scrap metal and tried to break it open.

"The four injured persons have been admitted to a hospital. A thorough probe has started," a senior police officer said.

"The condition of at least two injured persons is extremely critical and the death toll might increase," he said.

Meanwhile, the Jalpaiguri Police has issued an advisory urging people not to handle any firearms or explosives flowing down the river.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: Of the 23 missing army personnel from Burdang area, the bodies of seven have been recovered from different areas downstream while one was rescued and the search is on for 15 missing jawans, Sikkim Chief Minister P S Tamang said.

A total of 103 people, including the 15 jawans, remained missing after a cloudburst over Lhonak Lake in North Sikkim in the early hours of Wednesday triggered the flash flood.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: The toll in the flash flood in Sikkim mounted to 21 on Friday as Army and NDRF teams worked their way through slushy earth and fast flowing water in the Teesta river basin and downstream north Bengal for the third day in search of those who were swept away and are still missing, officials said.

Of the 23 army personnel who were missing from Burdang area, the bodies of seven have been recovered from different areas downstream while one was rescued and the search is on for 15 missing jawans, Chief Minister P S Tamang said.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: The first helicopter sorties and airborne rescue operations in the flood-hot regions of Sikkim are expected to start today, top officials have confirmed.

“Three Mi-17 choppers of the Indian Airforce are ready to take off today to make sorties of the flood hit regions in north Sikkim. We are waiting for the weather to clear up,” a top home department official in Sikkim told HT.

At least four districts of the eastern Himalayan state have been hit by the flash flood in the early hours of Wednesday after an outburst in the Lhonak lake, a high-altitude lake in north Sikkim.

Sikkim floods LIVE: Teesta Urja, the second biggest run-of-the-river hydro power project in India, suffered massive damage due to flood caused by the breach in Lhonak lake in north-west Sikkim on the intervening night of Tuesday and Wednesday.

The 1,200 MW power project on Teesta river, one of the most dammed rivers in the country, is located between Chungthang and Mangan in Mangan district in North Sikkim and is the biggest of nine working hydro projects on the river in Sikkim. Work on 15 dams is going on and another 28 are proposed over the river to tap its hydel capacity of about 4,200 MW.

Sikkim floods LIVE: Between 6am and 6.30am on Friday, a team of 60 rescuers from the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) will be on tenterhooks. They will be travelling to remote Chungthang in North Sikkim. The challenge in front of them is daunting – a dozen-off people feared trapped in tunnels for 48 hours without food, water or any possible exit. Nobody knows if the tunnels are inundated or not. Nobody knows if the 12-14 people are dead or alive.

Sikkim floods LIVE: The Sikkim government on Thursday warned against the presence of explosives and ammunition along the banks of the Teesta river, after an ammunition depot of the army in the northern part of the state was hit by flash floods a day earlier.

In an advisory, the state land revenue and disaster management department said any ammunition or explosive found along the river banks should not be picked up since they may explode and cause injuries.

Sikkim floods LIVE updates: PRO Defence, Guwahati: "Survey is being carried out by all agencies to assess the damage and plan restoration of road connectivity. The road link between Singtam and Burdang has been restored with the clearing of a single lane for vehicular traffic"

• More than 22,000 people have been affected due to the disaster.
• The affected were moved to 26 temporary shelter camps and provided aid and assistance.