Kathmandu — More than two weeks after a catastrophic glacial-lake flood tore through Nepal’s Rasuwa district, the country’s disaster authority says 5,130 people remain missing, while 1,385 bodies have so far been pulled from the debris left behind by the Rasuwagadhi flood.

Of those recovered, only 104 bodies have been formally identified, according to figures released Friday morning by Nepal’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority (NDRRMA), underscoring how much painstaking forensic work still lies ahead for grieving families across Rasuwa and Nuwakot districts.

Why Do Nepal Police and NDRRMA Numbers Differ?

One of the more confusing threads in the Rasuwa flood missing persons count is the gap between two official sources. Nepal Police, using data gathered through its 100 hotline, puts the missing figure at 4,089, roughly a thousand fewer than the NDRRMA’s district-level count.

NDRRMA spokesperson Shanti Mahat explained that the discrepancy likely stems from duplicate reporting. Family members frequently filed missing-person reports with both the police and local district emergency centers in Rasuwa and Nuwakot during the chaotic first days after the flood, and many of those who were later rescued were never formally removed from the lists.

“Our assumption is that some names of people who have already been rescued haven’t been taken off the missing list,” Mahat said. “Once we cross-check names against rescue records, the number could drop somewhat.”

Rescue Numbers Also Show a Gap

The rescue figures tell a similar story. NDRRMA’s latest count puts total rescues at 13,676 people, while Nepal Police reports only 9,287 rescues carried out directly by its own personnel. The difference is explained by NDRRMA’s figure also folding in rescues carried out by the Armed Police Force and the Nepal Army, which have both played a major role in reaching cut-off villages in the flood zone.

Nearly 600 Foreign Nationals Among the Missing

The disaster has hit far beyond Nepal’s borders. NDRRMA data shows 587 foreign nationals are unaccounted for, a figure compiled with help from the Nepal Tourism Board and travel agencies operating in the Rasuwagadhi corridor, a route popular with trekkers and pilgrims heading toward the Nepal-Tibet border and onward to Mount Kailash.

Travel agencies alone reported that 164 Nepali guides and staff were accompanying foreign trekking groups in the area when the flood struck. Separately, the Indian Embassy in Kathmandu, which has been coordinating closely with NDRRMA, says 194 Indian nationals remain missing, with officials cautioning that another 60–65 names could still be added to that list. Nepal Police’s own tally puts foreign nationals missing at 610.

Earlier reporting by Al Jazeera described the disaster as triggered by a glacial collapse that sent a wall of water down the Bhote Koshi and Trishuli rivers, with water levels reportedly rising as much as 9 metres in just 30 minutes.

Local Toll in Rasuwa and Nuwakot

Breaking down the numbers by district, NDRRMA reports 1,393 residents of Rasuwa and 641 residents of Nuwakot are among the missing — together accounting for roughly 2,000 of the local population still unaccounted for.

On top of that, 1,286 people from other districts who were in Rasuwa at the time, and 1,136 outsiders who were in Nuwakot, are also missing, a category that includes police, army personnel, civil servants, bank employees, and foreign visitors.

Taken together, the district-wise missing counts stand at 2,860 for Rasuwa and 1,787 for Nuwakot. NDRRMA has not yet broken down the missing foreign nationals by district.

Where the Bodies Have Been missing Found

Of the 1,385 bodies recovered so far, the largest single cluster — 364 bodies — was found downstream in Chitwan district, carried there by the Trishuli and Narayani river system. Another 450 bodies were recovered from Nawalparasi East and West (Susta).

Closer to the flood’s origin, 199 bodies were found in Nuwakot and 185 in Rasuwa itself, while Gorkha, Dhading, and Tanahun districts together yielded 185 more.

Nepal Police say they have collected DNA samples from nearly all recovered bodies, and samples have also been gathered from relatives of 1,712 missing persons to support identification through DNA matching — a process expected to take considerable time given the scale of the disaster.

Background reporting from Reuters and international outlets earlier described the flood as being triggered by an ice-and-rock avalanche from a glacier that dammed a river on the Nepal side before releasing a sudden, catastrophic surge downstream — a phenomenon disaster experts have linked to accelerating glacial melt in the Himalayas.

Mobile Phone Data Offers Partial Clues

In a bid to narrow down the numbers, Nepal Telecommunications Authority analyzed mobile network data from towers in Rasuwagadhi, Timure, and Syabrubesi at the time of the flood. The analysis found roughly 12,000 phone numbers were active in the affected area — about 7,000 on the Ncell network and 5,000 on Nepal Telecom.

However, officials caution the figure is far from a precise casualty indicator. Telecom sources note that some users carry two SIM cards in a single handset, inflating the count, while some towers themselves were swept away in the flood, making it impossible to know how many users were actually within the disaster zone versus simply connected to a tower near the affected market area.

“This data gives a rough idea of how many people were in the area, but it doesn’t help much beyond that,” one NDRRMA official said, adding that the main value of the phone records has been helping investigators establish where missing individuals were last located, rather than confirming how many perished.

What Happens Next

With identification lagging far behind recovery — just 104 of 1,385 bodies confirmed by name — authorities say the coming weeks will focus on DNA cross-matching, reconciling the police and NDRRMA missing-person databases, and continued search operations in the Trishuli and Narayani river corridors where debris and remains continue to surface.

This report is based on figures released by Nepal’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority and Nepal Police.