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Bhote Koshi–Trishuli flood response
On 26 August 2026 a massive flash flood tore through Rasuwa, devastating communities and destroying roads, bridges, communications and critical infrastructure along the Bhote Koshi–Trishuli river system.
Kickoff
Sunday 30 August, 09:00 NPT
Link emailed once the platform is confirmed.
Why this one
Where a weekend actually helps.
Nepal’s responders and experts are already at work. Nepal Hackathon helps them draw on engineers, scientists, mappers, satellite data, AI, cloud infrastructure, funding and other resources from around the world — for the emergency now and the work that comes after.
Satellite scenes waiting to be turned into damage maps. Gauge readings, weather records and melt signals sitting in separate systems. Drone footage arriving faster than anyone can process it.
That work splits well across a lot of people and a short stretch of time, wherever they happen to be.
The corridor
In the news
What outlets are reporting.
Third-party coverage, refreshed hourly, newest first. These are the publishers’ words and figures — including casualty and missing counts — not ours, and we have not verified them. What this project can stand behind is on the situation ledger.
Stored coverage is not loading right now. This is our display, not the reporting.
What we could build
Five things worth building.
Starting points, not assignments. Some of this is already under way in Nepal, and the real projects get shaped at the kickoff by the teams doing the work. Each one names what could realistically come out of a weekend on it.
- 01
Alert and monitoring
The signals mostly exist already — weather and melt anomalies, snow loss, river gauges, remote sensing — but they sit in separate systems and nobody has put them together. Combine them and test whether they flag dangerous conditions earlier than what is in place today.
Weekend outputBacktest a recent event and prototype a simple risk score, dashboard or API.
Skills that fit
Data and GIS · Climate science · AI and engineering
Problem Lead announced at kickoff
- 02
Danger zones
Work out what is actually downstream of an event: settlements, roads, bridges, schools, health facilities, hydropower, trekking routes. Much of it is mapped, but in separate places and at different times, so no one view shows what is at stake.
Weekend outputAn integrated map for one priority area, and a list of the important missing data.
Skills that fit
Data and GIS · Drones and remote sensing · Climate science
Problem Lead announced at kickoff
- 03
Climate-warming risk
Find where glaciers, glacial lakes, snow cover and terrain are changing fastest, and therefore where closer monitoring is worth the effort. Nepal and ICIMOD hold the expertise and much of the data; outside teams can bring newer imagery and the compute to compare it at scale.
Longer term outputAn updated risk-monitoring layer, or an expert-review watchlist.
Skills that fit
Climate science · Drones and remote sensing · Cloud and compute
Problem Lead announced at kickoff
- 04
Risk, inequality and development
The same flood does very different damage depending on road access, communications, healthcare and how quickly a community can recover. Census, infrastructure and geographic data already exist to show that — and to show where investment would change the most.
Longer term outputA pilot resilience or investment-priority map for one region.
Skills that fit
Data and GIS · Economics · Product and design
Problem Lead announced at kickoff
- 05
Drones and remote sensing
Drone teams in Nepal are already flying. The bottleneck is what happens next: turning footage into damage maps, blocked-road assessments and searchable imagery fast enough to matter. That part can be done from anywhere, at scale.
Weekend outputDemonstrate a drone-to-map workflow, and identify the technical, compute or equipment support local operators need.
Skills that fit
Drones and remote sensing · AI and engineering · Cloud and compute
Problem Lead announced at kickoff
The weekend
Three days. One of them is the handover.
It starts with listening: Nepal-based teams brief everyone before a line of code gets written. Here is the shape of it, and when the kickoff lands where you are.
- 01
Kickoff
Saturday evening PT / Sunday morning NPT
Nepal-based teams brief everyone on the situation, what is already under way, and the areas where help would make a difference. Teams form around those requests. Roughly ninety minutes.
- 02
Build
Sunday
Build, map, analyse. Short expert briefings and checkpoints through the day keep teams pointed at something achievable rather than something impressive.
- 03
Hand over
The following week
Nepal-side owners review what was made and decide what should continue. The strongest projects get connected to thirty days of funding, technology or technical support.
Kickoff, where you are
- Kathmandu09:00Sunday 30 August
- Delhi08:45Sunday 30 August
- Singapore11:15Sunday 30 August
- London04:15Sunday 30 August
- Berlin05:15Sunday 30 August
- New York23:15Saturday 29 August
- San Francisco20:15Saturday 29 August
- Sydney13:15Sunday 30 August
After the weekend
The hackathon is not the outcome.
What we are trying to produce is support that is still there in two years, when the attention has gone and the work has not.
72 hours
Publish what was produced, the data sources behind it, the known limitations, and clear ways for more people to help.
30 days
Keep the projects Nepal partners want to carry forward alive, with the support they ask for.
90 days
Pilot the strongest tools with the people and institutions who would actually use them.
Beyond
Maintain a network that responders, researchers and technologists in Nepal can call on for talent, technology and funding — including when the news has moved on.