Hopes fade for 40 missing after Nepal blizzard
KATHMANDU - Hopes faded on Sunday for survivors of one of Nepal's worst mountain disasters as villagers joined an intensive search by troops and government officials for as many as 40 people missing after an unseasonal blizzard killed 39.
More than 500 people have been rescued from a route popular with foreign adventure tourists that circles Annapurna, the world's tenth-tallest peak, among them 230 foreigners.
Rescuers turned to villagers familiar with the rugged, snow-clad terrain in the hunt for trekkers stranded in isolated areas after the tail end of a cyclone that hit neighbouring India last weekend triggered the snow and avalanches.
"We are not clear where the missing people are and whether they are safe or not safe," Yadav Koirala, the chief of Nepal's disaster management authority, told Reuters in Kathmandu, the capital. "We can only hope and pray that they are not dead."
