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Kyang Thang རྐྱང་ཐང་@Kyangs_Thang · Aug 27, 2026

1) Understandably many are confused where so much water came from with no lakes. We need to understand the scale of…

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Summary

A glacier collapse in Nepal released catastrophic energy equivalent to 30-40 Hiroshima explosions as it traveled 20km downslope, destroying the Rasuwagadhi border crossing. The immense potential energy from a 1.4km-high glacier face pulverized ice and rock into a dense sludge that gained destructive force traveling through steep terrain.

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  1. #1

    1) Understandably many are confused where so much water came from with no lakes. We need to understand the scale of this. 🧵 > The glacier face that collapsed is ~1.5 kms wide & 1.4 kms deep. That height alone is nearly twice that of Burj Khalifa.

    Kyang Thang རྐྱང་ཐང་@Kyangs_Thang · Aug 27, 2026

    If this report is indeed true & the earthquake was caused by the landslide, it has to be a collapse of immense proportions! > Either the whole glacier or mountain faces collapsed a kilometer or more into the Chhochen Khola below. > Afaik there are no glacial lakes in this valley. The glacial collapse has to be that intense to generate that amount of water & energy rushing down. It's still early to say, but this scenario holds true if it was generated here.

  2. #2

    2) This initial free fall into Chhochen Khola would've generated a potential energy >200 kilotonnes of TNT (~10-15 Hiroshima explosions), generating a seismic event equivalent to a 5.2 magnitude earthquake. The violent impact is enough to instantly pulverize ice, rock & snow into a sludge. It does not need a visible lake! Glaciers also hold massive amounts of water runoff underneath. Such is the massive impact.

  3. #3

    3) After initial collapse which likely pulverized most of the ice, rock, snow into a dense sludge, the massive energy surged down & first impacted the Rasuwagadhi border crossing. The slope gradient till this point would be ~100 meters per km (this is quite steep!) after the initial collapse of 1400 meters (1.4 kms).

  4. #4

    4) The border crossing, sitting in an extremely tight gorge bore the full brunt of the combined potential energy & other forces generated by:- > the initial collapse + the 20 km journey down the valley. It's hard to calculate a figure for this, but imagine it would be the force of 30-40x Hiroshima nuclear explosions ballpark.

  5. #5

    5) The Rasuwagadhi border was always very vulnerable to disasters. During the 2015 earthquake, it suffered heavy destruction due to landslide all around it. It's also very prone to flash floods, GLOFs or incidents like yesterday's. This is not the only example, as such infrastructure developments all over young fold mountains come at a cost. End 🧵