When the Bhotekoshi river surged on Wednesday morning, some people had time to run. Others did not.

Some fled along roads or up hillsides. Some raced ahead of the flood in their vehicles. One man survived by clinging to an electricity cable. Another escaped because he had been sent elsewhere shortly before the flood.

Those who survived watched settlements disappear, friends and relatives swept away and loved ones vanish.

‘I survived by holding on to an electricity cable’

A young man walks barefoot along a muddy road, his body covered in silt, struggling with every step.

The image of 36-year-old Rambachan Sah of Hajminiya in Rautahat’s Rajdevi Municipality-2 spread widely on social media after he survived the flood at Trishuli Bazar.

Sah had worked for 15 years at Shyam sweet shop near the bridge. On Wednesday morning, he was making sweets when the flood suddenly surged into the shop.

The current swept him away. His hand then caught an electricity cable. “I survived by holding on to the cable. I was given a new life,” he said. He hung from the wire for nearly half an hour as floodwaters roared below.

“When I saw no other way to save myself, I managed to grab an electricity cable hanging nearby. I fought for my life for nearly half an hour, caught between life and death,” he said. “Had my hands slipped from the cable, there was no chance I would have survived.”

The cable held. Sah survived, but three people from the shop, Sangita, her son Rahul and another worker, Binod Bhagat, remain unaccounted for.

Sah is now staying with a friend. “There may still be traces of mud from the flood on my body, but the fear of that morning is still fresh in my mind,” he said.

His elder brother, Rabindra, said the family could not reach him throughout the day. “It was only late in the evening, when we finally heard from him, that we knew he was safe.”

Sah has two young sons. Dinesh Sagar Bhusal, chief district officer of Rautahat, said 12 people from the district were known to be missing after the flood.

‘I survived, but lost my uncle’s entire family’

Sachin Khati of Jhapa survived because he was away from the settlement when the flood hit.

His maternal uncle, 33-year-old Raj Kumar Diyali of Buddhashanti-2 in Jhapa, had run a jewellery business in Syabrubesi-5, Rasuwa, for 15 years. He lived there with his wife, Shriti, and their four-year-old son, Shriraj. Sachin had been staying with them and helping with the business.

On Wednesday morning, Raj Kumar sent Sachin to Chilime for work. When Sachin heard about the flood, he rushed back. By the time he arrived, the settlement where they lived had been swept away.

“Early Wednesday morning, my uncle sent me to Chilime for work,” said Sachin, who is now staying under the protection of the Nepali Army in Dhunche. “When I heard that the flood had come, I rushed back. By then, the village where we had been staying had already been swept away.”

Sachin survived. Raj Kumar, Shriti and Shriraj remain unaccounted for. For Sachin, the wait for news of his uncle’s family has overshadowed his own survival.

“I wish we could at least find their bodies, even if we cannot find them alive,” Raj Kumar’s niece Radha Khati said through tears. “The whole family is waiting for them.”

The District Police Office in Jhapa said 13 people from the district who had travelled to Rasuwa for work, business or employment remained out of contact after the flood.

‘I was ahead; the flood was right behind me’

Raj Kumar Karki of Phedigaun in Thaha Municipality-2, Makwanpur, survived by driving ahead of the flood.

He had reached Betrawati in Nuwakot on Tuesday before travelling towards Timure the next morning to load goods. As he prepared to leave, he heard a warning over a loudspeaker: “The flood is coming, the flood is coming.”

Karki turned his container truck around towards Galchhi. Moments later, he saw a wall of floodwater rushing down and accelerated.

Vehicles and drivers ahead of him were swept away. Among them was another container truck driven by Kiran Bhujel.

“I survived by staying ahead of the raging Bhotekoshi river, with the flood right behind me. I drove as fast as I could to escape,” Karki said. “About nine container trucks and their drivers who were behind me had already been swept away.”

Watching the flood surge towards him in his side mirror, Karki kept driving. Before reaching Dhunge Bazar in Trishuli, he took the truck up into the hills.

“That saved both the truck and me. I barely made it out alive.” He spent the night on the hillside, watching Betrawati and surrounding settlements being destroyed. Much of the town was reduced to a riverbed, and he saw friends disappear into the Trishuli river.

Karki reached Kathmandu safely on Thursday with help from security personnel and returned home to Thaha Municipality-2 on Friday afternoon.

The 36-year-old has driven professionally for 20 years. He owns the container truck and has transported goods from Rasuwa to different parts of the country for the past five years.

The truck is now parked safely at his home. The scenes he witnessed, however, have stayed with him.

‘It still feels like a dream’

Gathe Kami of Salyan was working near the 216MW Upper Trishuli-1 hydropower project in Mailung, Rasuwa, on Wednesday morning when he heard what sounded like rocks crashing down the mountain.

Then he saw the Bhotekoshi river surging towards them.

Kami, 40, of Kumakh Rural Municipality-1, told everyone to run and sprinted up the forested hillside, about 500 metres above sea level. His heart pounded, and he briefly lost consciousness.

When he woke, the settlement below was buried. He could hear people screaming as they fled. “Only then did I realise that I had survived,” he said.

“It still feels like a dream. I can still see the whole thing in front of my eyes.” Kami said his childhood experience of running through steep hills while herding cattle and goats helped him escape.

“When I saw the destruction caused by the flood, I thought I was going to die. Fortunately, I survived. It feels like I have been given a new life.”

‘Running into the forest saved me’

Raju Budhathoki, a customs agent from Manthali Municipality-13 in Ramechhap, was resting in his room in Timure when the mountainside began shaking at around 8:45am.

“I was asleep when the whole mountain started shaking as if there had been an earthquake,” he said while receiving treatment in Trishuli. “There was no time to think. I ran outside to save my life.”

He headed towards a police post but saw officers fleeing too. Looking back, he watched houses in Timure collapse into the flood, some disappearing into the Trishuli river within seconds.

“I reached the forest about 500 metres above the settlement, and that is where I finally saved my life,” he said. “Looking down at Timure, I never imagined I would get a second chance at life. It all feels like a terrible dream.”

‘I came back with a new life’

Prakash Gautam of Gokarneshwar, Kathmandu, was also in Timure when a huge crashing sound shook the settlement.

“Within moments the entire settlement went dark and a black cloud covered the sky,” Gautam said. “I ran out without knowing where to go. I just had to save my life.”

He injured the little toe on his left foot while fleeing. From the forest, he watched bodies floating in the floodwaters as Timure was reduced to ruins.

“The homes and settlement were swept away, and now there is only a huge pile of sand,” he said. Gautam and others spent Wednesday night in the forest, surviving on instant noodles dropped by a Nepali Army helicopter.

An Army helicopter flew them to Bidur at around 10am on Thursday. “Only after I got on the helicopter did I feel that I would live,” he said. “I came back with a new life.”

‘Without that wave, I would not be alive’

Tulasi Bahadur Bhandari of Dolakha survived after a powerful flood wave threw him towards a hillside as black mud and water swept through a settlement in Rasuwa.

“Buildings suddenly started collapsing. We had no idea where the black surge of mud and water had come from,” Bhandari said from his hospital bed.

He ran, but the flood caught him. “The wave hit me hard and threw me away,” he said.

“If that wave had not thrown me towards the hillside, I would not be alive today,” Bhandari said. “Because it pushed me aside, I miraculously avoided being swept away.”