Is Nepal Safe to Trek After the Rasuwa Flood?

Routes · August 30, 2026

On the morning of 26 August 2026 a wall of water came down the Bhote Koshi river in Rasuwa district, northern Nepal. It swept through Timure, close to the Rasuwagadhi border crossing with Tibet, then Syabrubesi and Betrawati further down the valley. Villages, bridges and sections of the Pasang Lhamu Highway were destroyed. People lost their homes and their families, and the recovery in that valley will take far longer than any trekking season.

We are writing this because the question arriving in our inbox since is a reasonable one, and the answers being given elsewhere are either alarmist or evasive: is it still safe to trek in Nepal this autumn? For almost every route people book with us, the answer is yes, and the reason is geography rather than optimism.

The short answer

• Everest / Khumbu — unaffected. A different river system, a different district, reached by a different route.
• Annapurna — unaffected.
• Manaslu — unaffected. The circuit follows the Budi Gandaki, not the Bhote Koshi.
• Kanchenjunga and Makalu — unaffected, and far to the east.
• Langtang — the trailhead village was hit. The trail above it was not. Read the section below before booking.
• The Tibet overland route via Rasuwagadhi — closed. This is the one genuinely disrupted crossing.

If you are booked on Everest Base Camp, Annapurna or Manaslu with us, nothing about your trip changes. If you are booked on Langtang, we will have spoken to you already.

What actually happened

The flood was not ordinary monsoon rain. Scientists studying the flow have attributed it to a large ice and rock avalanche — a glacier collapse on the Tibetan side — that fell into the Lhende Khola and sent an enormous surge of water and debris down the valley. A magnitude 4.4 earthquake was recorded across the border at 8:37 that morning, shortly before the water arrived, and officials believe the tremor may have loosened the ice and rock that gave way.

That distinction matters for anyone trying to judge risk. This was not a flood caused by a wet week, which would imply every river in Nepal was equally dangerous. It was a single catastrophic release into one specific catchment, and it stayed in that catchment.

Which treks are affected, and which are not

Langtang, honestly

Langtang is the one that needs a real answer rather than a reassuring one. Syabrubesi, where the trek starts, was hit. The road up from Kathmandu was cut in places. But the trail itself climbs east into the Langtang valley, away from the Bhote Koshi, and that trail was not touched by the water.

So the trek exists. What is uncertain is the approach — the state of the road, the state of Syabrubesi as a place to stay, and whether it is decent to spend a night in a village that is housing displaced families. Our position for the autumn is that we will run Langtang only when the local lodge owners tell us they want the business and can accommodate it, and not before. We would rather move you to Manaslu than be the first party to arrive somewhere that is not ready.

Everest, Annapurna and Manaslu

These three account for the overwhelming majority of trekking in Nepal, and none of them go anywhere near Rasuwa. Everest is reached by flying east to Lukla. Annapurna is west, on an entirely separate river system. Manaslu follows the Budi Gandaki, and although it sits between the two on a map, it is a different valley with a different catchment.

You will see a certain amount of writing online that treats "Nepal floods" as a single national condition. It is not. Nepal is a country of separate mountain valleys, and what happens in one has no bearing on another twenty ranges to the east.

Flying to Lukla this season

Unrelated to the flood, and worth knowing regardless: in the busy autumn weeks, flights to Lukla often operate from Ramechhap (Manthali) rather than Kathmandu. That is a four to five hour drive from Kathmandu, usually leaving around two in the morning to make the first flight window.

This catches people out every year. If an itinerary quotes you a Kathmandu–Lukla flight in mid-October without mentioning Ramechhap, ask the question before you book. Our Nepal itineraries state which airport applies to your dates, and the transfer is included either way.

What we are doing

• Our partner crews in Nepal are reporting daily, as they do through every season, and we pass on what they tell us rather than what we read.
• No Langtang departures are being sold until the valley says it wants them.
• Existing autumn bookings are unchanged on Everest, Annapurna and Manaslu.
• Anyone booked on a route we withdraw moves to an alternative or takes a full refund of what they have paid us, under our normal booking terms.

If you have a booking, or are about to make one

The honest position is that autumn 2026 in the Khumbu and Annapurna will be a normal season. Book it as you would any other year. Make sure your insurance covers the maximum altitude on your itinerary and includes helicopter evacuation above 5,000 m — that is not advice specific to this season, it is advice for every season, and it is the single most common gap we see.

And if you were considering Langtang, consider Manaslu instead this year. It is quieter than Annapurna, harder than Everest Base Camp, and the teahouses along it will be glad of you.

This page will be updated as the situation in Rasuwa changes rather than replaced, so the date at the top is the date it was last checked against what our crews are reporting.

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