He Was Swept Away by Nepal’s Deadly Flood—Then a Mango Tree Became His Only Hope

A routine day of construction work in Nepal turned into a desperate fight for survival when a massive wall of water, mud and rocks suddenly swept through the area.

For 24-year-old laborer Bibek Kumal, there was almost nowhere to run.

Kumal was digging a toilet pit outside a newly built house in Bidur, downstream from the worst-hit Rasuwa district near Nepal’s Himalayan border with Tibet, when he heard a strange hissing sound.

His four co-workers, who were standing above the roughly 1.5-meter-deep pit, shouted for him to get out and run.

He managed to climb from the pit—but by then, his co-workers had already fled.

“I started running. Then a wall of water came thundering down,” Kumal recalled from his hospital bed at Kathmandu’s National Trauma Centre, according to Reuters.

The torrent caught him.

Mud, rocks and debris carried him downstream as buildings and other structures were swallowed by the flood.

Then, in a moment that may have saved his life, Kumal became trapped in a mango tree.

“Luckily I was stuck up in a mango tree,” he said. “Had there been no mango tree, I would have been washed away to death.”

The house he was working on disappeared

While clinging to the tree, Kumal watched the house where he had been working disappear beneath the violent flood.

Police eventually reached him and pulled him to safety.

He suffered injuries to his right leg after being struck by the rushing water and a large rock. His own home, located elsewhere, was not damaged.

Kumal was later treated in Kathmandu, alongside other people injured in the disaster.

His survival story has emerged as Nepal struggles with one of its most devastating recent flood disasters.

Death toll rises as hundreds remain missing

The disaster struck communities along the Nepal-Tibet border, with massive flooding and landslides destroying homes, roads, bridges and other infrastructure.

Later updates from international news agencies put the death toll substantially higher than the initial figures reported on Wednesday.

Reuters reported at least 157 deaths in Nepal, while the Associated Press reported that the combined toll in Nepal and Tibet had reached at least 160, with hundreds still missing.

The disaster has also left many foreign nationals unaccounted for, adding to the enormous challenge facing rescuers.

What caused the catastrophic flooding?

Initial reports suggested that a 4.4-magnitude earthquake may have been linked to the event after seismic activity was detected around the time of the disaster.

But subsequent analysis cast doubt on the earthquake explanation.

Reuters later reported that the catastrophe was linked to the collapse of ice and rock in the Himalayan region, producing an avalanche and a massive surge of water, mud and debris down the river system. The Guardian also reported that later seismic analysis indicated the detected energy was more consistent with a landslide rather than an earthquake.

The sudden nature of the event made it especially destructive.

Entire sections of roads and infrastructure were swept away, while villages and other settlements downstream were inundated.

Another survivor describes the terrifying escape

Kumal was not the only survivor to recount the devastation.

Among those being treated was 11-year-old Rihana Lamichhane, who was returning home after her school was closed because of the flooding.

As she crossed a river, floodwater suddenly came rushing toward her.

Rihana suffered injuries to her chest and leg but survived.

“I am happy to be safe. I have no idea what happened to my friends,” she said, according to Reuters.

Her mother, Rita, said she rushed to search for her daughter after receiving a call about the disaster.

A tree, a few seconds—and a life saved

Kumal had already survived a devastating earthquake as a teenager in 2015, when nearly 9,000 people were killed in Nepal.

But this time, his survival came down to something far more immediate: a mango tree standing in the path of a deadly torrent.

As the flood carried away the world around him, that tree gave him something to hold on to.

For Kumal, it was the difference between being swept away and being rescued.

And amid a disaster that has already claimed more than 150 lives, his story stands as one extraordinary reminder of how a single moment—and one unlikely refuge—can change the outcome of a catastrophe.