Imagine mourning a loved one, performing their final funeral rites, and then getting a phone call that they are actually alive. That is the reality a Nepali family faced after 64-year-old Chandrika Shrestha emerged from the wreckage of a devastating flash flood.
When torrential floodwaters ripped through Nepal's Bhotekoshi river basin on August 26, entire communities vanished beneath heavy gray silt and debris. Among the missing was Chandrika, whose four-storey house in Betrawati was swept away and completely swallowed by mud. For over a week, her relatives scoured the hazardous riverbanks. Faced with impossible terrain, decomposing bodies nearby, and fading hope, the family accepted the tragic truth. They traveled home to Kathmandu's Sano Bharyang and began traditional funeral rituals, using an effigy made of kusha grass to represent her.
Then came day eleven.
The Miraculous Discovery in Betrawati
An Armed Police Force team, originally dispatched to the disaster-stricken area for road clearance work, heard a faint, distressed sound coming from beneath a collapsed structure. Rescue workers immediately began digging through the thick, concrete-like mud by hand. Breaking through a window on what remained of the upper floor, they found Chandrika Shrestha alive in a semi-conscious state.
The sheer physics of the disaster explain how she managed to endure. The violent flash flood had shifted her home roughly 100 meters, burying the lower three and a half floors entirely while leaving a narrow pocket of air on the topmost level. Trapped inside this tiny air pocket surrounded by sludge, Chandrika survived for more than a week.
Rescuers managed to free her in a tense 45-minute operation. First aid was administered on site before a helicopter airlifted her to the Nepal Army's Maithili Barracks in Trishuli, followed by a transfer to the Birendra Army Hospital in Chhauni, Kathmandu.
Hope Amid National Grief
Chandrika’s survival offered a rare moment of joy during one of Nepal's darkest modern natural disasters, which claimed over a thousand lives and left thousands more unaccounted for. Prime Minister Balendra Shah publicly noted that her miraculous rescue provided a vital surge of hope to a grieving nation.
Rescue operations across the Himalayan nation have thrown up extraordinary survival stories against all odds. Just a day prior to Chandrika's rescue, emergency teams pulled a Chinese national alive from deep inside a hydropower tunnel in Rasuwa, proving that human endurance in enclosed spaces can stretch far beyond conventional expectations.
For Chandrika’s family, the emotional whiplash has been profound. Her young grandson, who spent days weeping and singing prayers for her return, rushed to be near the hospital. Doctors placed her under strict observation for 72 hours, limiting direct visitors, but her relatives finally traded grief for cautious relief.
Search and recovery teams continue clearing blocked infrastructure and tackling difficult terrain across the flood zones, proving that perseverance matters when lives hang in the balance.
