Dhunge (Nepal) (AFP) – Days after a wall of water and debris ripped through Nepal, Shanti Lamichhane sat on a fruit crate in the dirt where her village once stood, staring at what remained of her home.

Issued on: 30/08/2026 - 05:10

3 min Reading time

Across Nepal's flood disaster zone, survivors are returning to villages reduced to mud and debris, searching for belongings, documents and fragments of lives swept away in minutes.Lamichhane said she was waiting for bulldozers to finish clearing the path so she could return."I want to retrieve a few things, but it is not just about that," she told AFP. "All my memories are there too."The village of Dhunge, once home to roughly 150 families, now lies in ruins, reduced to a swampy expanse with an ominous rotting stench -- one of dozens of settlements obliterated by the Himalayan floods.

Residents climb up to their house to search for belongings at the Dhunge Bazaar in Nepal's Nuwakot district © PRABIN RANABHAT / AFP