Worse Than Three Gorges? Tibet-Nepal Flood Was Just The Start, China’s $170B Dam Is 3,000x Bigger

On August 26 a massive mudslide wiped out a series of hydropower projects built along Nepal's river valleys. In the Rasua and Nuakot areas around 27 hydropower projects were buried or destroyed including major facilities such as the Rasuagadi hydropower project and Trasuli 3A and 3B. The total damage capacity was about 700 megawatts. This footage was filmed by construction workers at a worker housing area near a hydropower project when the mudslide first struck. The video shows large numbers of factory buildings and worker camps at the site. Today the entire construction area has been flattened. According from data from Nepal's Independent Power Producer Association and National Disaster Management Agencies, about 933 people linked to hydropower projects remain missing accounting for 22% of the country's total missing persons which stands at 4247. Because these hydropower projects rely on deep underground water diversion tunnels when mud slides carrying massive rocks and debris blocked tunnel entrances and exits the construction passage became sealed off death traps leaving many workers trapped deep underground in darkness. Rescue footage shared on social media shows soldier covered in mud crawling through tunnels to rescue trapped workers. To save workers trapped deeper inside rescue teams use drilling equipment to bore holes through the top of tunnels and pump air inside hoping to keep possible survivors alive. On August 29th the Nepal army announced that it had rescued 208 people from tunnels linked to the Trisuli 3a hydropower project including 38 Chinese nationals and four Indian nationals. Dozens of people are still believed to be trapped deep inside the tunnels. At the Rasuagadi hydropower project 93 workers were reported missing. Rescue teams used thermal imaging drones to search through mud filled tunnels but found no signs of life. The military led rescue operation was forced to withdraw after failing to locate survivors. Of particular concern as images from the disaster area emerged and more information was revealed the Nepal army later acknowledged that the construction of the Lantang Kola hydropower project was actually underway beneath Lantan mountain where the glacier collapse occurred. The project was designed with a capacity of 20 megawatts with tunnels stretching about 2 to 2.4 miles. After the disaster around 60 people inside the tunnel were reported missing including about 25 company employees and 35 subcontractor workers. The power house was completely washed away. Rescue teams later entered the tunnel to begin emergency search operations. This suggests that the disaster may not have been caused solely by glacier melting due to climate change but could also be linked to human activities including heavy machinery operations and blasting. Scientific data further indicates early signs of instability in the mountain. Geophysicist professor Manucha Shirzai's analysis of Sentinel-1 earth observation satellite radar images from January 8 to August 19, 2026 showed that the ground in the area had already been sinking at a rate of about 0.4 inches per month before the glacier collapse. Dr. Mohamed Farouk Azam, a cryosphere expert at the International Center of Integrated Mountain Development said the direct trigger of the flood was actually a bedrock collapse. When the underlying rock layer failed a glacier mass measuring about 131 million to 261 million cubic yards collapsed from above and plunged into a valley 3,300 feet deep. This raises a critical question before the glacier collapse why did the underlying rock lose stability first? When the high altitude rock formations are already near a critical state of stability could blasting vibrations, rock unloading, groundwater disruption and river diversion caused by hydropower construction have become the final triggers that destabilize the mountain and glacier system? Some experts therefore argue that while global warming is a factor in glacier collapse studying the impact of human activities on rock instability may be even more important to understanding such disasters. A close analysis shows that the damaged hydropower projects in Nepal generally use a run-of-river plus long tunnel design which is building low dams upstream and drilling tunnels several miles through mountain to divert water for power generation. But now it appears that this model can become a death trap when facing extreme geological disasters. More concerning is that on the other side of the Himalayas China's Yarlung-Sangpo hydropower project with a total investment of 1.2 trillion yuan about US 170 billion is now being rapidly built. The project is designed to generate 300 billion kilowatt hours of electricity annually equivalent to building three more Three Gorges Dam. Chinese authorities have described it as a century project personally promoted by Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping with a political status almost comparable to the Xiong'an New Era project. The core design concept of the Yarlung-Sangpo project is an expanded version of Nepal's tunnel diversion model. Its scale could be 3,000 times larger than Nepal's Lantan Kola hydropower project which was located near the glacier collapse site. It is far more ambitious and potentially far more dangerous than building a massive dam like the Three Gorges Dam. Let's go back in time to July 8, 2025 when a major flood struck the China-Nepal border region. At the time flash floods from the Landa River destroyed hydropower facilities, Giron port and bridges. Experts later warned that glaciers in Tibet's high mountainous were melting at an accelerating rate creating extremely high risk of flash floods and earthquakes which nearby infrastructure projects potentially facing destruction. However, days later on July 19th, Chinese Premier Li Qiang suddenly appeared in Nianchi, Tibet and announced the official start of a construction of the Yarlung-Sangpo downstream hydropower project. As the Yarlung-Sangpo river flows through the Miling and Midog areas of Tibet, it is blocked by Mount Namcha Bawa forming a massive horseshoe-shaped bend of nearly 180 degrees. This winding section of the river stretches for hundreds of miles yet the straight line distance is only about 31 miles with an elevation drop of up to 6,600 feet. According to plans previously released by the project contractor, Power China, the project would build a water storage facility upstream, construct a low dam in Pai Town, Midog County at the river's narrowest point to divert water and excavate multiple massive tunnel systems tens of miles long deep inside mountains reaching 8,200 feet below the surface. The plan would redirect the Yarlung-Sangpo which currently travels hundreds of miles around the bend directly through the mountains. The enormous elevation difference would power five cascading hydropower stations before the water is released back into the original river channel near Xiran. The Chinese Communist Party has given this approach a name, cutting off the bend and making the river straight. Put more simply, it means carving through the Himalayas, changing the natural flow of Yarlung-Sangpo river and turning an entire mountain range into a giant power generator. Although this design appears to avoid controversy surrounding the construction of a massive dam, it is fundamentally based on the same concept as the hydropower projects destroyed in Nepal, only expanded on a vastly larger scale. In Nepal, this design has already been shown unable to withstand debris flows triggered by high altitude glacier collapse. The Yarlung-Sangpo Grand Canyon where the Yarlung-Sangpo project is located has even more extreme geological conditions than Nepal's Rasuwa region. It contains the world's largest vertical elevation differences on earth's surface reaching 16,400 to 19,700 feet along with active fault zones and massive hang glaciers. The Yarlung-Sangpo project is essentially a trillion yuan gamble being carried out on one of the planet's most dangerous geological fault zones. It is worth noting that Midog county where the proposed super dam project is located has long experienced landslides triggered by glacier melt. In the early hours of August 30th, continuous heavy rainfall triggered a mudslide disaster on the Bingo river in Midog county. Around 98 feet of the G219 highway at kilometer maker K6089 plus 500 was washed away cutting off the entire road and making it unsafe for traffic. Even more alarming after the concrete culvert bridge collapsed no steel reinforcement bars could be seen inside. Critics called it another example of a poorly built tofu drug project. Some commenters pointed out that today's Giron could become tomorrow's Yarlung-Sangpo. The Himalayas which might have required much greater natural forces to collapse in the past are being pushed closer to a critical state by years of hydropower construction activities including blasting, excavation, slope cutting, seismic damage and changes to water systems. Eventually only a relatively moderate earthquake, engineering blast, glacier collapse or heavy rainfall event could push the system past its breaking point. The tragedy that struck Nepal's hydropower projects has shocked the world. If a similar disaster were to occur at the Yarlung-Sangpo project, what level of catastrophe would it create? Would it become a miracle of human infrastructure or a cross-border water bomb hanging over millions of people downstream? The risk facing the Yarlung-Sangpo hydropower project are not merely theoretical concerns on paper. They are threats that have been repeatedly appeared throughout history and in recent events. First let's look at the risk during construction. When workers excavate a massive network of tunnels stretching dozens of miles and buried more than 3,300 feet underground, they will face extreme geological challenges. The first is rock burst caused by high ground stress. Under the enormous pressure of mountains thousands of feet thick, once tunnel boring machines break through rock layers and disturb the existing balance, hard granite can suddenly explode inside confined underground spaces. Sharp fragments can shoot outward like bullets at high speed, posing deadly risk to workers and equipment. The second danger is sudden high-pressure water and mud inflows. Fault zones are widespread beneath the Yarlung-Sangpo canyon, hiding countless high-pressure underground rivers and geothermal water sources. If excavation accidentally breaks through one of them, high temperature mud and water under pressure of dozens of atmospheres could suddenly burst out and fill tunnels within minutes. Given the altitude and depth of the Yarlung-Sangpo project, if a disaster similar to Nepal's tunnel flooding occurred or if an internal water in rush accident happened, rescue operations would face a world-class challenge. Oxygen shortages, communication failures and difficulties locating victims could leave thousands of workers trapped deep underground, repeating and potentially magnifying the desperate scene seen in Nepal's tunnels. Even if the project were miraculously completed, nature's test would only be beginning. On both sides of the Yarlung-Sangpo Grand Canyon stand Mount Namcha Bara at 25,531 feet and Gaia Peri at 23,930 feet. Dozens of massive hang glaciers have developed along the mountain slopes. As global temperature rise, these glaciers are becoming increasingly unstable. If a massive glacier collapse occurs, millions of tons of ice, snow and rock could plunge more than 16,400 feet into the valley, creating a super debris flow traveling at more than 60 miles per hour. If this destructive flood hits the Lo Dam at Pai Town or the Tailwater Dam near Xiran, massive rocks and sediment could instantly block water intake and discharge gates. Underground power generators worth trillions of yen could be completely disabled by sudden water interruption or backflow. Even more dangerous is the secondary disaster of a river blockage and sudden collapse. In 1950, an 8.6 magnitude earthquake struck Medog, Tibet, triggering massive landslides that blocked the Yarlung-Sangpo River and created a huge landslide dammed lake. Days later, the barrier collapsed, sending a devastating flood downstream and killing thousands of people. If another major earthquake or massive ice and rock collapse blocks the river in the future and the resulting lake eventually breaks through the natural barrier combined with project's own water structures, waste rock piles and reservoirs, it could create a catastrophic flood far beyond anything recorded in history, overwhelming everything downstream. In addition to achieve the advertised annual power generation target of 300 billion kilowatt hours, the project would need to divert more of the river's flow into tunnels inside the mountains. This means the natural river channel around the Great Bend could become a completely dried out ecological depletion zone during dry seasons, causing irreversible environmental damage. Native plateau fish species including the Yarlung-Sangpo schizothorax could face extinction. The large scale mountain blasting and road construction needed to transport equipment would strip away fragile surface soil and worsen erosion. This massive tunnel system would act like an endless pumping machine draining underground water networks inside the mountains. This could cause hundreds of square miles of virgin forest above to dry out and die, triggering a systemic ecological collapse. In addition, the Yarlung-Sangpo hydropower project is far more than a domestic infrastructure project in China. It directly affects the geopolitical concerns of the entire South Asian region. After leaving Chinese territory, the Yarlung-Sangpo river enters India, where it is known as the Brahmaputra river. It then flows into Bangladesh. India and Bangladesh have long viewed large-scale upstream water modifications with deep concern and fear. Indian geostrategist and columnist Brahma Chalani has repeatedly issued strong warnings on international platforms. He has described China's construction of massive dams in the Himalayan seismic zone as water bombs hanging over downstream countries. Chalani argues that the project area has fragile geological structures and active fault lines. The massive reservoirs could potentially trigger reservoir-induced earthquakes, and if a dam failure or landslide created lake collapse occurred, northeastern India's Assam plains and the low-lying Bangladesh delta could face catastrophic flooding. Beyond concerns about extreme dam failure scenarios, changes to everyday river flows have also created major geopolitical anxiety. Even if the dams remain structurally intact, massive water projects can trap sediment and create a hungry river effect downstream, accelerating riverbank erosion and damaging agricultural ecosystems. At the same time, reservoir regulation would artificially alter natural water flow patterns between dry seasons and flood seasons. Without real-time and transparent cross-border hydrological data sharing, downstream countries' early warning windows could be severely reduced. One notable feature of the recent Nepal flash flood disaster was that there was no corresponding heavy rainfall in the local river valley at the time. The floodwater appeared to suddenly surge from upstream. This has further intensified concerns in India and other countries. Without transparent information, upstream engineering activities, hydrological changes, or sudden secondary disasters could be amplified into cross-border chain disasters. Tying the lives and property of tens of millions of people to a massive project located in an active seismic zone where information is not equally shared has become a potential time bomb in South Asia's geopolitics. This cross-border anxiety over water resources and deep mistrust was fully exposed during recent international media exchanges. After a flash flood struck in the Himalayas on August 26, causing severe casualties in Tibet and Nepal, downstream areas of India were also affected. The disaster quickly developed into an intense diplomatic and public opinion battle. On August 28, India's Republic TV program debate with Arnab held a heated discussion on the issue. The show's well-known hardline host Arnab Goswami invited Gao Zhikai, a former Chinese foreign ministry translator known for his nationalist stance, to join the discussion remotely. The atmosphere was highly confrontational with both sides trading sharp arguments and repeatedly interrupting each other. During the program, Indian guests and the host directly targeted China, accusing excessive development in upstream Tibet of being the main cause of the flooding that affected downstream communities in India. They argued that large-scale mountain blasting, dam construction, river system modification, and continuous infrastructure development upstream had damaged the already fragile high-altitude ecosystem and geological balance, ultimately contributing to the disaster. Goswami also sharply questioned whether China was deliberately using its geographic control over upstream rivers to weaponize water resources and use them as a strategic tool against India. Basing a series of aggressive accusations from the Indian side, Gao Zhikai adopted a strongly defensive stance. He firmly denied claims that China was using a water system to threaten India and Nepal, accusing the Indian host of imposing malicious intentions that did not exist. Regarding the disaster, while Chinese authorities have insisted that it was purely a natural glacier collapse inside Nepal, Nepal has expressed deeper concerns and frustration. Rudders reported that three months before the disaster, during China-Nepal meetings, Nepal had explicitly requested that China provide real-time monitoring data on glacier activity, avalanches, and glacial lake levels rather than only routine rainfall forecast. In high mountain valleys, glacier collapse can transform into floods extremely quickly, making conventional weather warning ineffective. The insufficient sharing of critical disaster warning data has further intensified neighboring countries' concerns over the lack of transparency surrounding China's upstream projects. Facing repeated geological disaster and international criticism, why is China still determined to push forward with the 1.2 trillion yuan Yarlung-Sampo hydropower project? The answer lies in the Chinese Communist Party's long-standing infrastructure obsession and political belief that human ambition can overcome natural limits. In the pursuit of what is called national rejuvenation, its dual carbon goals, and regional emergency control in Tibet, China is willing to spend 1.2 trillion yuan to build a mega project on one of the planet's most geological unstable and ecological fragile regions. However, history has repeatedly shown that massive projects built in defiance of natural laws eventually face consequences from nature itself.