The death toll of Nepal’s Annapurna Circuit has risen to 39 after days of searches, officials say.
Snowstorms and avalanches have killed the trekkers on one of the most popular hiking routes in the Himalayas.
After a fourth day of searches, 384 people have been rescued from the Annapurna trail, 216 of them foreigners, in the country’s worst-ever trekking disaster.
Helicopters have been searching parts of the trail high as 19,000ft for survivors.
The government said the priority was to rescue 22 stranded hikers.
The trekkers are stranded at Thorung La pass, and face a shortage of food and water. Army helicopters tried to rescue them but failed after being unable to land.
It is still unclear which climbers have been accounted for and which are still missing.
The task of the authorities is made more complicated because there are thousands of climbers in Nepal at this time of the year.
Army helicopters tried unsuccessfully to rescue them on October 18 between the Mustang and Dolpa districts, government rescue coordinator Suresh Acharya said.
The death toll of Nepal’s Annapurna Circuit has risen to 39 after days of searches
Twenty bodies have been recovered but 19 bodies are still in the snow and a rescue team will be deployed on October 19 to dig them out and retrieve them by air, he said.
One of the main trekking routes – the Thorung La pass, the high point of the Annapurna Circuit – is now “relatively safe” after the army cleared snow, he said earlier.
Rescuers have only limited resources and most of the missing and dead are believed to be at the maximum heights that helicopters can reach.
Nepalese, Japanese, Israeli, Canadian, Indian, Slovak, Vietnamese and Polish trekkers are said to be among the dead.
Many survivors have been left with severe frostbite and will have to have limbs amputated.
Nepal earns huge revenues from the tens of thousands of trekkers and climbers who flock to the Himalayas every year.
This has been a particularly deadly year for Nepal’s trekking and mountaineering industry.
An avalanche on Mount Everest in April killed 16 Sherpa guides and resulted in a significant drop in the number of expeditions to the world’s highest peak.
The latest disaster comes at the height of the trekking period.
Nepal’s Annapurna Circuit is one of the oldest trekking trails in the Himalayas and has been open to foreigners since 1977.
This circuit is considered one of the best treks in the world though road construction is threatening its reputation and its future as a classic trek.
The trekking route is crossing Thorung La Pass, which sits at an altitude of 5,416 meters (17,769 feet) and connects the village of Manang in the east with the famous Hindu temple of Muktinath in Mustang in the west. The pass was originally used by locals as a trade route, herding agricultural products on yaks and donkeys.
The trekking to complete the Annapurna Circuit starts in the town of Besi Sahar, approximately a six-hour drive from the capital Kathmandu or a three-hour drive from Pokhara, a popular tourist destination.
Annapurna Circuit is one of the oldest trekking trails in the Himalayas and has been open to foreigners since 1977 (photo AP)
Many tourists still choose to walk from Besi Sahar and complete the trek in about three weeks, which takes them through small villages where locals provide food and accommodation. But in the past decade, an unpaved road runs to Chame, the headquarters of Manang district, which gives many trekkers the ability to rent jeeps and cut short the trek by at least a few days.
The circuit goes through Manang, from where trekkers can choose to hike to the Tilicho lake, one of the highest lakes in the world, sitting at an altitude of 4,919 meters (16,138 feet).
Described as “the best long distance trek in the world”, the Annapurna Circuit is known as the “apple pie” circuit due to the baked goods offered by tea houses along the route.
The circuit passes Mount Annapurna, world’s 10th highest mountain and one of the most dangerous.
This week, at least 32 people have been killed, and dozens are missing, after a devastating blizzard hit the key hiking route in Nepal.
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Nepal’s Annapurna Circuit death toll has risen to 32 after the hiking route was hit by major snowstorms and avalanches earlier this week, officials say.
Mountain rescue teams are out for the fourth day, searching for missing trekkers, and it is feared more bodies lie beneath the snow.
A total of 282 people have been rescued from the mountain ranges in what is Nepal’s worst-ever trekking disaster.
Some climbers have accused their guides of abandoning them.
A spokesman for the Trekking Agencies’ Association of Nepal told the AFP news agency the focus of the rescue operation was now geared towards the recovery of bodies.
The task of the authorities is made more complicated because there are thousands of climbers in Nepal at this time of the year.
Rescuers have only limited resources and most of the missing and dead are believed to be at heights of around 16,000ft.
Nepal’s Annapurna Circuit death toll has risen to 32 after the hiking route was hit by major snowstorms and avalanches
Nepalese, Israeli, Canadian, Indian, Slovak and Polish trekkers are among the dead.
Many survivors have been left with severe frostbite and will have to have limbs amputated.
On October 18, helicopters were again searching the area around a high mountain pass on the Annapurna Trail, where most of the deaths occurred.
Nepal earns huge revenues from the tens of thousands of trekkers and climbers who flock to the Himalayas every year.
This has been a particularly deadly year for Nepal’s trekking and mountaineering industry.
An avalanche on Mount Everest in April killed 16 Sherpa guides and resulted in a significant drop in the number of expeditions to the world’s highest peak.
The latest disaster comes at the height of the trekking period.
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