Nepal Principal’s Last-Minute Evacuation Saves More Than 900 Students From Flood
BIDUR, NEPAL — WEB DESK: A school principal in Nepal is being credited with helping save more than 900 students and 16 faculty members after ordering an emergency evacuation just minutes before a catastrophic flood swept through their school in the Trishuli Valley.
Rajendra Dawadi, head of Tribhuvan Trishuli Secondary School in Bidur, Nuwakot district, acted after urgent warnings arrived that floodwaters were racing downstream through communities, destroying homes and bridges.
The danger had not yet been fully confirmed at the school when the warnings arrived. Dawadi decided that waiting for additional verification could put hundreds of children at risk. He stopped classes, sounded the school bell and ordered students and staff to leave immediately for higher ground.
His decision proved crucial.
Within minutes, a massive surge of water, mud, rocks and debris swept into the area and engulfed the school compound. The campus was devastated, but the students who had been inside had already escaped.
School Had About 14 Minutes to Evacuate
Reuters reported that the initial warning reached the school through its accountant, who received a telephone call from a relative in nearby Rasuwa district.
The warning gave the school approximately 14 minutes to get students away from danger.
Other warnings followed rapidly.
According to AP, Dawadi was inside a classroom when the accountant alerted him. Another teacher then received a warning by telephone, and shortly afterward a parent arrived at the school intending to collect her child because she had heard that a dangerous flood was approaching.
Rather than waiting to determine whether the warnings were completely accurate, Dawadi ordered the evacuation.
Students and teachers were directed uphill to safer ground.
The decision illustrates a critical principle in disaster response: when credible warnings indicate an immediate threat to life, delaying evacuation for absolute certainty can dramatically reduce the time available to escape.
School Buses Were Told to Turn Back
Dawadi also realised that evacuating the campus would not be enough.
Some students were still travelling to school, so he contacted drivers and instructed them not to bring their buses into the threatened area. Reuters reported that he halted classes, alerted buses that were already en route and coordinated the evacuation as the flood approached.
The action prevented additional students from entering the danger zone.
The evacuation involved more than 900 students who were already at school, alongside faculty members. Some later reports refer to the school’s much larger overall enrolment, but the strongest contemporaneous reporting from Reuters and AP specifically supports the figure of at least or more than 900 students evacuated from the campus that morning.
That distinction matters because reports citing the school’s total enrolment should not be interpreted as evidence that every enrolled student was physically inside the building when the flood struck.
Students Watched Their School Disappear
After reaching higher ground, students and staff watched as the flood transformed the area below them.
Water mixed with mud, rocks and debris surged across the school compound, severely damaging or sweeping away buildings. Express Urdu reported that Dawadi watched from safety as the campus was engulfed and effectively disappeared beneath the flood.
The school had stood between the Trishuli River and a hydropower canal, making its location particularly vulnerable to the enormous surge. Reuters reported that the devastated campus now effectively lies within the riverbed.
Dawadi himself had attended the school as a student before eventually becoming its headmaster.
His immediate priority now is not only rebuilding but ensuring that any replacement school is constructed in a safer location.
Two Members of School Community Missing
The evacuation prevented what could have been a mass-casualty event, but the school community did not emerge completely unscathed.
AP reported that two staff members remained missing following the disaster.
Express Urdu likewise reported that two members of the school staff were unable to escape in time and remained unaccounted for.
Their status means the story should not be framed simply as one in which “everyone was saved.”
The evacuation protected hundreds of children and most staff, but members of the school community remain among those missing after the wider disaster.
Flood Disaster Triggered by Himalayan Glacier Collapse
The school evacuation was one episode in a much larger catastrophe that struck Nepal and neighbouring Tibet after a glacial collapse in the Himalayas unleashed a devastating torrent of water, ice, rock and mud.
The August 26 disaster devastated communities along river valleys, destroyed infrastructure and damaged hydropower facilities.
The death toll has continued to change as rescue teams reach previously inaccessible areas.
In its latest September 1 update, Reuters reported at least 939 deaths and said around 600 people remained trapped, primarily around damaged hydropower installations. More than 11,000 people had been rescued.
Earlier combined figures covering Nepal and Tibet had exceeded 950 deaths with thousands reported missing, illustrating how rapidly casualty estimates have changed during the disaster.
For publication, the latest verified figures should therefore be used with a timestamp rather than presenting any death or missing-person total as final.
Schools Across Northern Nepal Hit Hard
The destruction of Tribhuvan Trishuli Secondary School was not an isolated event.
AP reported that at least 69 schools were destroyed or affected, disrupting education for nearly 19,000 students.
The disaster has left authorities confronting both an immediate humanitarian emergency and a longer-term challenge of restoring education in communities where school buildings and transport links have been destroyed.
For children who escaped the Trishuli school, rebuilding will also involve recovering from the psychological impact of watching their classrooms disappear shortly after they fled.
Dawadi has urged authorities to reconstruct damaged schools quickly and ensure students receive the support they need.
A Decision Made Without Certainty
What makes the Tribhuvan Trishuli evacuation particularly significant is that Dawadi acted before he had definitive confirmation that the school would be hit.
He had warnings from several people, a rapidly developing disaster upstream and hundreds of children under his responsibility.
Instead of waiting, he treated the potential consequences of a false alarm as far less serious than the consequences of ignoring a genuine warning.
Minutes later, the flood reached the campus.
That sequence is supported by both AP and Reuters reporting and is the strongest factual basis for describing Dawadi’s decision as life-saving.
The episode has since made the principal a widely praised figure in his community, but Dawadi has characterised what he did as fulfilling his responsibility toward his students rather than an extraordinary act of heroism.
