South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People

24/09/2026

Nepal Minister for Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation Biraj Bhakta Shrestha told Parliament on Sept. 23: - More than 800 people working at hydropower projects and related facilities remain unaccounted for nearly a month after the Bhotekoshi floods. Of those missing, 47 are employees of the Nepal Electricity Authority.

-The largest number of missing people are linked to the 216-MW Upper Trishuli-1 project. Of the 1,433 people working there before the flood, 955 were rescued or later made contact themselves, while 439 remain unaccounted for, according to the minister. A Chinese national was rescued alive from the project on the 12th day after the flood. Thirty-nine bodies have so far been recovered from the project’s tunnel.

-At the Upper Trishuli-3A project, 39 people remain unaccounted for. Two employees, Sanjay Sah and Kabir Maharjan, were rescued alive on the 10th day of the disaster. One body was recovered from the project.

- 178 people remain unaccounted for at Upper Trishuli-3B, 93 at Rasuwagadhi Hydropower Project, 7 at Mailung Khola Hydropower Project and 3 at Rasuwa-Bhotekoshi Hydropower Project. At Langtang Khola Hydropower Project, 39 people are still missing. 19 people were rescued and 2 bodies were recovered, he said.
- Five Nepal Electricity Authority employees were found dead during search and rescue operations at the powerhouse of Chilime Hydropower Station. One employee remains unaccounted for.

-Two people are missing from the Madhya Trishuli Ganga Hydropower Project and three from the Trishuli Hydropower Station. Employees are also missing from the Devighat Hydropower Station, the Trishuli-3B hub, the Rasuwa Distribution Centre and the Chilime-Trishuli transmission line, although the minister did not give separate figures for those sites.

Shrestha tells Parliament that search and rescue teams are still looking for workers believed to be trapped in underground structures or swept away by the August 26 disaster.

24/09/2026

River Godahada at Kurula site in Ganjam district, Odisha has crossed its HFL 32.1 meter dated 29.10.2025 at 07:00 hour on 24.09.2026 and continues to flow in extreme flood with rising trend.

24/09/2026

River Pamuleru at Valamuru site in East Godavari district, Andhara Pradesh has crossed its HFL 395.82 meter dated 26.07.2023 at 03:00 hour on 24.09.2026 and flowing in extreme flood situation with rising trend.

23/09/2026

"What a 1-in-100 flood really means?

Return periods: understanding probability

One of the most common sources of confusion in disaster risk comes from expressions such as “a 1-in-100-year flood” or “a 1-in-200-year earthquake.” These phrases are widely used in disaster risk reduction, yet they are often misunderstood in ways that can seriously distort how people perceive risk.

A 1-in-100 flood does not mean once every 100 years or that they are safe for 99 years. It means a flood with a 1% chance of being exceeded in any given year. Instead, it is a way of describing chance, not timing. Specifically, a 1-in-100-year event has a 1% probability of being exceeded in any given year. That same flood can happen this year, next year, or several times in a lifetime.

This distinction is subtle but crucial. Probability does not work like a calendar. Each year is a new roll of the dice. The fact that it happened recently does not reduce the chance of it happening again soon." https://www.preventionweb.net/understanding-disaster-risk/key-concepts/deterministic-probabilistic-risk

23/09/2026

-“The river is a river, not a line,” sang folk singer Patty Griffin. After nearly 4 years in orbit, a radar satellite launched by NASA and CNES, the French space agency, is revealing the truth of the lyric. By simultaneously measuring the water levels and breadth of rivers around the world, the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) satellite is exposing the true complexity of those blue lines on a map. They are dammed, braided, frozen, or drained—with behaviors that hydrologic models struggle to capture, says Colin Gleason, a hydrologist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst who led a study, published last month in Geophysical Research Letters, which found that the vast majority of rivers are not simple, idealized channels. “Human-affected weird rivers dominate the global riverscape.”

SWOT is exposing humans’ effects on rivers—and challenging flood prediction models

23/09/2026

-This research reveals the basic spatial pattern of global river modeling errors for the first time, setting the stage for a new, improved generation of models.

SWOT satellite observations can be used to assess the skill of global river models in absence of in situ gauge data We map the likely skill of global river models, deductively interrogating earli...

23/09/2026

The Sept. 19 tunnel leakage disaster in Parbati II HEP raises wider questions about tunnel safety, muck dumping, slope stability and the vulnerability of settlements below Parbati II HEP infrastructure. The available information raises serious concerns about possible negligence by NHPC management. It is also concerning that the administration has constituted an inquiry committee that includes NHPC officials. This raises questions about the committee’s credibility to determine the exact cause of the incident, examine NHPC’s role and responsibilities and establish the contribution of the project muck dumping site in increasing the damage.

The 800 MW project, operated by NHPC, has an 83.7 m high concrete gravity dam at Pulga. The dam diverts water from the Parbati river through a 32 km long HRT to an underground powerhouse at Siund a…

23/09/2026

-It is well known that human activities directly impact the water cycle and the distribution of water resources, but quantifying such effects from space is challenging. By directly estimating mass change rates from raw satellite range observations, we reduced signal loss and mapped substantially finer-resolution global terrestrial water storage trends. Herein, we have identified trends that we attribute to human activities in 40 regions around the world. Anthropogenic land and water use was significantly associated with strong TWS trends in every nonpolar continent except Australia, and groundwater depletion linked to agriculture was particularly severe.

Human activities have directly altered the water cycle through water management, aquifer pumping, agricultural irrigation, and land use change. Alt...

23/09/2026

-For decades, river conservation strategies in monsoon-fed regions have focused on maintaining minimum water flows, assuming that keeping the water moving is enough to sustain river health. This study challenges that assumption, showing that flow alone cannot protect native aquatic life if the water running through the riverbed remains heavily polluted. By demonstrating that long-term nutrient loading and urban sewage easily override the natural dynamics of a tropical river, this work serves as an urgent wake-up call for city planners and environmental policymakers. It highlights that upgrading urban sewage treatment and strictly enforcing water quality standards are critical steps required to preserve the ecological uniqueness of our rivers and protect the freshwater resources that millions of people depend on for their survival.

Researchers from Agharkar Research Institute have found that chronic urban pollution is overpowering the monsoon's natural flushing power, permanently altering microscopic life in one of the world’s m...

21/09/2026

The Central Electricity Authority has said in its report that there have been some serious operational and maintenance issues at BBMB’s Pandoh project, part of Beas Sutlej Link Project. In a separate development, Punjab government affidavit in the NGT has said that due to mismanagement at Bhakra-Pong dams, there has been avoidable flood disasters in Punjab in several years. Both developments confirm what we have said about role of BBMB projects in 2023 and 2025 floods in Punjab.

The CEA report also mentions mismanagement of dredging operations, leading to loss in generation at the Dehar Power Station of the Pandoh Dam, as alleged by the Punjab government earlier. This also has serious implications for the safety of the project. The report unfortunately does not seem to go into the reasons for faster siltation of the Beas Sutlej Link project. The dumping of muck into the river by various hydropower, highways and other infrastructure projects has majorly contributed to this. An independent assessment would help bring all such factors to light.

The report recommends focused attention to the safety and operation of Pandoh Dam and continued efforts to check the inflow of high silt into the reservoir. Questions were raised regarding privatis…