Sikkim: Choppers expected to evacuate stranded people, drop relief material

Three Mi-17 helicopters were expected to fly to Sikkim’s flood-hit areas on Friday to evacuate stranded people and to drop relief materials even as low stratus clouds, fog and rain in the higher altitudes continued to be a challenge. “We are waiting for the weather to clear up,” an official said.

The Indian Air Force and the Army choppers were unable to fly on Thursday due to bad weather.

Officials said airlifting stranded people particularly those old and infirm and in need of immediate medical assistance will be the priority. “Evacuated people would be flown to Ringhim in Mangan from where they would be transported to the state’s capital Gangtok,” said the official.

One chopper was in Lachen while two others were at Bagdogra in north Bengal. “NDRF [National Disaster Response Force] teams are waiting in Bagdogra to take off. The choppers will fly as many times as they can to the flood-hit areas in north Sikkim such as Chungthang and Lachung looking for stranded people who need to be evacuated and also supply relief materials,” the official said.

Officials said the Mangan district was the worst hit while the town of Chungthang has suffered 80% damages and has been cut off from the rest of the state. The roads to the town have been damaged and communications lines have been snapped. The Tessta-II hydropower dam has been washed away.

The toll from the flash floods in Sikkim and parts of West Bengal rose to 18 on Thursday even as 98 people, including 22 army personnel, remained missing. The floods were triggered on Wednesday after a glacial lake overflowed following torrential rains and cut off roads, and communication, and washed away bridges and other infrastructure.

The official said they were in touch with counterparts in West Bengal as many bodies might have been washed away down the river to the neighbouring state.

The Sikkim State Disaster Management Authority on Thursday said 22,034 people were affected while 2,011 people were been rescued. The state government has set up 26 relief camps.

The weather office has said it did not have an accurate reading of the rainfall due to the remoteness of the terrain. Experts attributed the floods to unusually intense showers and a glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) in the South Lhonak Lake in northwestern Sikkim around 1am. They said that the climate crisis had left the Himalayan region more vulnerable to such stresses and disasters than ever.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) said its satellites observed that the lake had burst. In a statement, Isro said the lake reduced in area from 167.4 hectare on September 28 to 60.3 hectare on October 4.

A GLOF is caused when the moraine (debris accumulated over the years by a glacier) that usually functions as a dam, creating a lake, is breached. It was not immediately clear as to what may have triggered the GLOF although the risk has loomed large for at least a decade, said experts.

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