In a viral video, Bohara can be seen sitting inside the shovel of an excavator. Her mud-covered clothes and the exhausted expression on her face speak volumes about the destruction caused by the floods. Guna Maya Bohara, 97, has become a symbol of hope amid Nepal’s devastating floods.
The operation to rescue Guna Maya Bohara took four hours and involved the police and the Nepalese army.
A glacier collapse on Wednesday caused sudden massive flooding in the Bhote Koshi River in Nepal’s Rasuwa district. It took police and the Nepal Army around four hours to pull her out of the debris. Her great-nephew, Dipak Bohara, had travelled from Kathmandu to help with the rescue. That image has since travelled far beyond the rescue site. The country’s meteorology department has reportedly warned of fresh rainfall and thunderstorms in the area, which could hamper rescue operations.
The sight of a 97-year-old woman being carried through the wreckage in an excavator’s bucket has become one of the defining visuals of the disaster. At least 626 bodies have been recovered so far. Around 2,500 people are still missing, including over 300 Indians.
