By Christine Chen
SYDNEY, Sept 4 (Reuters) – Australian disaster response specialists left for Nepal on Friday to join the search for survivors after the catastrophic Himalayan floods, as the government expressed “serious concerns” for the welfare of its 36 missing citizens.
More than 1,200 people have been confirmed dead and some 5,000 remain missing after a glacier collapse triggered the floods on August 26. The Nepal government says 583 foreign nationals are among the missing.
A 15-member Australian Disaster Assistance Response Team, made up predominantly of drone pilots from state emergency services, was deployed following a request from Nepal’s government, authorities said.
“We are still holding out hope that people might still be surviving in sort of some locations and hopefully this team can help to locate any of those people,” Jeremy Fewtrell, the commissioner of Fire and Rescue New South Wales, told reporters at Sydney Airport on Friday.
“Predominately the team is made up of pilots for our specialist drones,” he said, adding that they were equipped with different drones able to survey large areas from the air and navigate confined spaces that may be inaccessible to rescuers.
“This response that we are providing is in response to the request from the Nepali authorities. And so it’s providing them with a suite of tools that they thought will really help them.”
Seven Australian Federal Police disaster victim identification specialists are also due to arrive in Nepal on Saturday.
The government announced the deployment on Thursday. Foreign Minister Penny Wong said 19 Australians were already in Nepal, including consular officers, humanitarian police and defence and police personnel.
Nepal’s foreign minister said last week that international help was needed in specialised and technical areas.
Local authorities have said the chances of finding survivors were fading but rescue efforts continued along the border with China.
Some relatives of missing Australians have also travelled to Nepal to conduct their own searches, Australian media reported.
Australian Treasurer Jim Chalmers said on Friday that 36 Australians remained missing, after two were confirmed safe overnight.
“We still have very serious concerns for the 36 Australians that we haven’t been able to locate yet,” he told ABC News Breakfast.
(Reporting by Christine Chen in Sydney; Editing by Kate Mayberry)
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