A Filipino doctor who went on a pilgrimage in Nepal has gone missing following the massive flash flood that tore through the Nepal-Tibet border this week.
Physician Juan Carlos Manalo was traveling with a group of pilgrims when the series of flash floods and subsequent landslides took place. He has been unreachable since, according to a Facebook post by his sister, Chiara Manalo.
Chiara said the family last heard from Juan Carlos on Tuesday, August 25, at 1:21 p.m. Philippine time, a day before the floods struck.
The group’s last known location was the immigration office in Gyirong, on the Tibetan side of the border, Chiara said.
Juan Carlos had been traveling with a Kailash Mansarovar Yatra pilgrimage group organized by the Isha Foundation, an India-based spiritual organization, led by Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev
Sadhguru said in a social media post Wednesday that 77 pilgrims from one of his Kailash groups were at the Gyirong immigration office, on their way back from the pilgrimage, when the flood struck and swamped the building and much of the town. He said there was no official information yet on their whereabouts.
Chiara told Philstar.com her brother had spent the past couple of years volunteering as a medical worker at an Isha Foundation center in India, and had gone there in May, by her recollection.
He joined this year’s Kailash tour around August 6 or 8, Manalo said.
Juan Carlos had usually sent updates to his family every day until their parents got a call on the night of August 26 about the floods.
Chiara said she reached out to the group’s Philippine contact person and was told her brother’s group was at the immigration office – on its way back to India – when the flash flood hit.
The family is asking anyone with information to contact their family: Jose Rodrigo Manalo (+63 917 302 3077), Dinah Marie Manalo (+63 917 514 3465), or Chiara Manalo (+63 917 791 7849).
Manalo appears to be the Filipino traveler the Nepal Tourism Board has counted among hundreds of missing foreigners since Thursday.
The Department of Foreign Affairs said on Friday the Philippine Embassy in New Delhi and the honorary consulate in Kathmandu were coordinating with Nepali authorities and are “awaiting confirmation from Nepali authorities on a Filipino national who is reported missing.”
The massive August 26 floods were set off by a glacier collapse in the Himalayas that triggered a landslide and sent an avalanche of water, ice and debris.
More than 300 people have been confirmed dead and hundreds more remain missing in Nepal, with additional deaths and missing reported on the Chinese side of the border, according to the latest tallies.