Nepalis pin hopes on ‘wall of the missing’ in hunt for relatives after deadly flood

A Buddhist monk looks at photographs of missing and deceased people pasted on wall outside Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital, following flash floods and a mudslide, in Kathmandu, Nepal, September 1, 2026
| Photo Credit:
Reuters

Sati Sigdel makes daily visits to a hospital wall in Kathmandu blanketed in hundreds of photographs, some of missing relatives, others of retrieved bodies yet to be identified, in desperate hopes of finding news of her cousin.

“We put up her photo three days ago, but we still haven’t heard anything,” Sigdel said of her cousin, Sweety Paithan, one of more than 4,200 missing after a catastrophic flood triggered by a glacier collapse killed more than 1,200 people.

Hopes for survivors are dimming steadily more than a week after the disaster, although Nepali authorities are keeping up relentless search efforts, with some 900 feared trapped in hydroelectric power plants.

Late on Wednesday, a handful of people from across mountainous Nepal were carefully scanning the pictures on the wall at the capital’s Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital, and asking nearby guards if they had heard their names.

“We’re hoping for a miracle,” said Sapna Neupane, who was hoping to make contact with her maternal uncle’s family of four, all missing. “It’s hard just to stand in front of this wall, looking at thousands of pictures.”

Some pictures are embedded in posters meticulously filled in with details of the missing and contact numbers, while others are handwritten scribbles under photographs.

In one, the word “Missing” is emblazoned above the heads of a couple standing beside each other. Another depicts a muscular young man, with a close-up of a left-arm tattoo, probably to help identify him.

At the nearby Pashupatinath Temple on the banks of the Bagmati River, some families were cremating straw effigies, having given up hope after unsuccessful searches for their relatives.

“It weighs heavily on my heart,” said Tapindra Prasad Timalsina, as a Hindu priest chanted prayers while others poured water on an effigy of his relative, 21-year-old Sabin, before lighting the pyre, in a rite typically reserved for the dead.

Back at the wall, hope was undimmed for Sigdel, however, in her vigil maintained since Monday.

“I come here every day with my relatives and friends, hoping for news,” she said.

Published on September 3, 2026