India: at least 19 dead in an avalanche in the Himalayas, 10 missing

The group of climbers, made up of 34 apprentices from a local mountaineering institute, the Nehru Institute of Mountaineering, seven instructors and a nurse, fell victim to an avalanche near the summit of Mount Draupadi ka Danda-II on Tuesday. an altitude of 4,880 meters in the state of Uttarakhand (North).

"Nineteen bodies have been found. Ten people are still missing," Ridhim Aggarwal, of the Uttarakhand disaster agency, told AFP as poor weather conditions hampered the search.

“Relief operations have resumed for the day but are subject to the weather,” she added. "The weather is bad".

Police, disaster authorities and the Indian Air Force have been mobilized to assist in the search and have so far rescued 32 people.

An advanced helicopter landing station has been set up near the avalanche site, nearly 4,900m above sea level, where a successful test landing was made on Thursday morning, the Indo-Tibetan Border Police said. .

Among the surviving climbers, Naib Subedar Anil Kumar said that with some of his climbing companions, they had been dragged into a crevasse when the avalanche hit their team.

“Once the snow started to settle, I undid the ropes to rescue my teammates,” he told the Indian Express daily published on Friday.

"However, we couldn't do much," he said.

Sunil Lalwani, another survivor, praised the composure of the group's instructors who he said saved many lives.

"We were 50 or 100 meters from the top with our instructors in front of us, when suddenly an avalanche hit us and took everyone away," said Mr. Lalwani quoted Thursday by the daily Hindustan Times.

"It happened in seconds and we were thrown into a crevasse. We somehow managed to breathe (...) It is thanks to them (the instructors) that we are alive today 'today."

Veteran mountaineer Savita Kanswal, a member of the instructor team, was among the dead. Earlier this year, she summited Everest and nearby Mount Makulu in just 16 days, a women's record.

In August, the body of a mountaineer was found two months after he fell into a crevasse while crossing a glacier in Himachal Pradesh, another northern Indian state.

And last week, the body of famous American mountaineer and skier Hilaree Nelson was found on the slopes of Manaslu, a Nepalese mountain. She was reported missing while skiing down the eighth highest peak on the planet.

On the day of the accident, an avalanche had buried camps 3 and 4 installed on the 8,163 meter high mountain, killing the Nepalese mountaineer Anup Rai and injuring a dozen people.

Studies are lacking to quantify the impact of climate change on the Himalayas, but climbers have observed widening of crevasses, water in previously snow-capped areas and the proliferation of glacial lakes.