As international aid poured into Nepal, the impoverished Himalayan nation’s overwhelmed army, police and emergency services struggled to cope with the scale of the devastation wrought by the quake, which killed more than 4,000 people and injured thousands of others.
Neighbors carried Amrita Tangol for an hour down from her village in the hills after she was paralyzed from the waist down when her house collapsed on her during the earthquake. PHOTO: JESSE PESTA/THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Badly damaged roads, landslides and at-times heavy rains that limited the number of helicopter flights in parts of the country prevented search-and-rescue specialists as well as supplies of medicines, water, tents and other critical aid from reaching people in need.
There was also an element of large-scale triage, with authorities focusing rescue resources on the capital, Katmandu, and other large population centers. Katmandu and its surrounding valley are home to about 2.5 million people.
“We are trying to send rescue teams. We are trying our best to clear the roads,” said Kamal Singh Bam, a spokesman for Nepal’s national police. “There is a problem with distribution to people who are not in Katmandu.”
Lakshmi Prasad Dhakal, a spokesman for the country’s Home Ministry, said the military had stepped up efforts on Monday to reach remote areas by air.
“These are very hard-to-reach areas that cannot be reached by foot. They can only be reached by helicopter,” Mr. Dhakal said. “Some people have been rescued.”
Katmandu’s Durbar Square: Before and After
In Sipa Ghat on the banks of the Indravati River, four people died after the quake hit. Residents, fearing aftershocks, said they were afraid to re-enter their damaged homes and were living under tarps. They said they were short of food and drinking water.
As for aid—from the government or elsewhere—“there’s nothing at all so far,” said Ekbahadur Thapa, 56 years old, a farmer who lives about an hour outside the small town.
Aerial Footage of Epicenter
The epicenter of the Nepal earthquake was in the Gorkha district. This video shows aerial footage of destruction and landslides in the region. Photo/Video: AP
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Nepal, which ranks among the world’s least-developed countries and was until recently a monarchy, has suffered years of political upheaval—first a decadelong civil war in which the government fought Maoist insurgents—and, more recently, wrangling over a new constitution.
Saturday’s disaster posed a major challenge for the government and the country’s already slow-growing and tourism-oriented economy.
Even in Katmandu, relief efforts were strained. Hospitals in the capital were overflowing with patients who were bedded down on floors and in tents outside. Doctors at some said they were running low on medicine and surgical supplies as they tried to treat traumatic injuries.
Fuel was in short supply. And most of the capital was in darkness and without electricity on Monday night.
The police force’s Mr. Bam said search-and-rescue efforts were hindered by a shortage of heavy equipment needed to lift debris to free any survivors and recover bodies.
Communications posed another challenge, he said. Mr. Bam said Monday that central-government authorities were still unable to establish contact with local officials in some places, including Sindhupalchok, a rugged district about 70 miles from Nepal’s border with China.
Nepal Races to Reach Earthquake Victims
Army, police and emergency-service personnel are struggling to get supplies to many left homeless by a 7.8-magnitude earthquake that struck Nepal over the weekend, killing more than 4,000 people.
Across large swaths of mountainous Nepal, there are no roads and the only means of travel are footpaths. It can take hours or days to walk from village to village. Already patchy telecommunications were even more limited after the disaster.
DEADLIEST EARTHQUAKES OF THE 21ST CENTURY
- Jan. 12, 2010: A 7.0-magnitude earthquake in Haiti killed an estimated 316,000 people, claiming more lives as a percentage of a country’s population than any recorded disaster.
- Dec. 26, 2004: A massive 9.1-magnitude earthquake in the Indian Ocean left 227,898 people dead or presumed dead.
- May 12, 2008: A 7.9-magnitude earthquake struck Sichuan, China, killing 87,587 and injuring about 375,000.
- Oct. 8, 2005: A 7.6-magnitude earthquake in Pakistan killed 80,361 and injured more than 69,000.
- Dec. 26, 2003: A 6.6-magnitude earthquake killed at least 31,000 people in southeastern Iran, injuring 30,000 and leaving 75,600 homeless.
- Source: U.S. Geological Survey, The Wall Street Journal.
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“There is very limited information coming from rural areas. There is no information beyond Katmandu on collapsed buildings and injuries,” said Unni Krishnan, head of disaster response for U.K.-based aid organization Plan International. “Logistics continue to be a huge challenge.”
The armed forces of neighboring India moved forward Monday with a massive airlift of relief supplies. Other countries also sent rescue workers and aid. But outside Katmandu, the tons of blankets and pallets of drinking water they were flying in were hard to find.
Victims of Saturday’s earthquake waited for ambulances at Katmandu’s airport on Monday after being evacuated from destroyed towns.PHOTO: ALTAF QADRI/ASSOCIATED PRESS
“We have not yet ventured into rural areas,” said S.S. Guleria, deputy inspector general of India’s National Disaster Response Force, which has deployed hundreds of search-and-rescue personnel to Nepal.
He said Indian teams were working on the outskirts of Katmandu at the request of Nepalese authorities. “The extent of damage is heavy in these areas,” Mr. Guleria said.
Uddav Timilsina, the chief district officer of Gorkha, which lies near the earthquake’s epicenter, said land routes to large areas remained blocked by landslides, which had trapped dozens of locals and tourists, many of them injured, in remote areas.
“Most of the people who are waiting for rescue are facing so many problems, but it is very difficult to reach them,” Mr. Timilsina said. He said three helicopters were helping with rescues on Monday but that more were needed.
Government aid and relief materials were yet to reach Gorkha, Mr. Timilsina said. Nonprofit groups had sent small quantities of tents, blankets and medicines, but these contributions were not adequate, he added.
“We need 20,000 tents, 25,000 blankets,” Mr. Timilsina said. “But we are getting 100 tents, 200 blankets, some dry fruits. It is very difficult.” He said people planned to sleep out again Monday night, on the streets and in open spaces.
In Sipa Ghat on Monday afternoon, neighbors of Amrita Tangol, who was paralyzed from the waist down after she was buried in the ruins of her home, carried her across a rope bridge to Sipa Ghat. She was loaded into a jeep to drive her to a hospital in Katmandu.
“There are more people who need help,” said one of the men who had helped carry Ms. Tangol an hour’s walk down from the hills on a homemade stretcher.
Not far down the road, sitting beside a funeral pyre for his 86-year-old mother on Monday, Sanobabu Bika lamented the lack of aid. “No assistance has reached,” he said. “There’s nothing to eat here.”
His mother died when the family’s mud-and-stone home collapsed on her. At the time, Mr. Bika was in the field preparing the ground for a corn crop. “As soon as I felt the quake I thought of her,” he said. “We ran home and the goat, buffalo and she were all dead.”
Some help—in the form of 60 or so Nepalese soldiers on foot—made its way slowly into the countryside about an hour’s drive toward Katmandu from Sipa Ghat. The soldiers, some carrying pick axes and shovels, walked single file along the rough, gravel road.
They said they were heading toward a different village, however. Their leader, Maj. Nirej Mahara, said the goal was to go “wherever rescue was needed.”
—Niharika Mandhana contributed to this article.
Write to Jesse Pesta at jesse.pesta@wsj.comhttp://www.wsj.com/articles/nepal-rescuers-struggle-to-reach-quake-victims-1430113791