An unforgettable disaster in Nepal and anxious hours searching for people with whom there is no contact after the mud tsunami that flooded villages, swept away bridges and roads and a border crossing with hundreds of tourists.
Among the survivors is a Bulgarian woman who was evacuated by air. However, there is still no information about another of our compatriots.
Suzana Alexieva saw the disaster with her own eyes. First, dust and stones started flying, followed by shouts that everyone had to save themselves. Then the wave came, the surviving Bulgarian told bTV.
"The roads were very bad, because it rained all night. We were traveling very slowly and we were in line for our turn to cross the border between Nepal and China. Suddenly, something started flying in the air - dust, stones. The local tour guides who were accompanying us started jumping out the window and shouting that we all had to get off the bus," Susanna said.
"Our greatest luck was that there was a staircase where our bus and another one were parked. We just climbed up the mountain. After about three hours it started to get quieter, the river calmed down. The military came, there were helicopters," she said.
"The picture was very scary, because where we were, the river curves and this wave came, hit one of the rocks and then went back and started spinning. I have never seen anything like it. I watched what was happening and at that moment I didn't think about the devastation. I wasn't afraid," says Susanna.
"Then people who live down by the river started coming. A woman said that she was the only one out of her family who had survived, and her house was gone. Our tour guide told us that a helicopter with people on board had crashed yesterday when he was evacuating them", she added.
"We stayed and climbed even higher, because the helipad was bigger there and a large helicopter for 22 passengers had to come. We spent the night in animal huts. I was amazed that the military service responded immediately and brought us food. Police officers came all night to check if everything was okay. They said that they would evacuate us in the morning. And indeed, that's when helicopters started flying", says Susanna.
The woman was rescued along with other people in distress in the area. Her personal documents remain with the tour guide they were with.
"First they evacuated the local population, and then us. We arrived at a military checkpoint where there were medics who examined us. Then they wrote down our names and said we had to wait. Then a small helicopter for four people and four women arrived and we were evacuated to Kathmandu. An ambulance immediately picked us up from the airport and asked us if we wanted to go to the hospital or to our embassy. They had collected our passports and they were gone. I didn't know what to do," says Susanna.
"As far as I understand, her passport was with the group leader and the fact that there is no connection with him and we don't know, it is very possible that he died", said Dr. Nikolay Yankov, Ambassador of the Republic of Bulgaria to the Republic of India.
According to him, there is no information that the group leader was Bulgarian.
"We have no information that he was Bulgarian. She was the only Bulgarian in the group", said Nikolay Yankov.
Earlier today, Susanna was included in the list of the National Tourism Board of Nepal of those missing after the flood. However, one of our compatriots remains missing.
"The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, through the embassies of the Republic of Bulgaria in Beijing and Delhi, has been officially notified by the Chinese authorities of a missing Bulgarian citizen as a result of the floods in Tibet and Nepal“, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
The embassy in Delhi has received three reports from Bulgarians.
"The first was about a Bulgarian tourist who was left without a passport and called for assistance. Then a report was received from a travel company about a group of 15 people who are in Tibet. We have explained that the border crossing is closed and destroyed. The other - the National Tourism Board of Nepal mentioned a missing citizen. Within 10-15 minutes, we contacted the Nepalese side and established that the missing citizen was exactly the one we already had contact with“, explained Nikolay Yankov.
A Bulgarian has sought assistance from our embassy in Beijing to contact his wife, who is traveling in an organized way in the affected region. She is safe and is in Tibet.
The group of 15 Bulgarians passed through the border crossing, which was devastated, a few days ago. They are currently in Tibet.
"Everyone is alive and well, without any problems or concerns. We have a satellite phone and a real-time satellite tracking device“, said Preslav Konov, manager of a tour operator.
Preslav Konov's group now faces one question - how will they return to Nepal from Tibet to return to Bulgaria.
"At the moment there is no confirmed route from where the group will return. In the worst case, we will move overland to Lhasa, or we will have to get to Beijing. Our problem is time resources and money, which, against the backdrop of the tragedy, is a trivial issue“, commented Preslav Konov.