On early Wednesday morning, a tour group operated by Baltimore-based company Himalayan Glacier Adventure and Travel Co. was preparing to enter Tibet and travel to Mount Kailash, a revered site among Hindus, Jains and Buddhists.
The group, which included 40 travelers and seven guides, was looking forward to following the footsteps of millions of other pilgrims by touching the holy water of Lake Manasarovar and circling the sacred mountain clockwise, said the company’s managing director Sanket Pandey.
But then, disaster struck.
Catastrophic flash floods swept through the area of Nepal where the group was staying, destroying roads and buildings and killing hundreds. The combined toll in Nepal and Tibet rose on Saturday to 676 dead and nearly 3,000 people missing, according to the Associated Press.
That includes all 47 traveling with Himalayan Glacier Adventure and Travel, whose group featured tourists from U.S., Canada and Australia.
The last time anyone from the company heard from the group was during a check-in Wednesday morning as they finished breakfast, Sanket said. The group, which had divided up to stay in two different hotels, was planning to meet before crossing into Tibet.
Since the flash floods, Sanket has spent his days fielding calls from family members of the missing and sharing news coming from Nepal, from where his father and the company’s CEO, Sagar Pandey, has been coordinating efforts.
Sanket said in an interview Saturday that he is “just trying to keep every bit of sanity and provide any bit of comfort to the families.”
Himalayan Glacier Adventure and Travel is limited in what it can do because access to the disaster zone is still limited, Sanket said.
Some family members are trying to get access to the last known GPS coordinates of the travelers through their wearable devices or phones, he said. But many technology companies only release information to law enforcement, which require relatives to first file missing persons reports.
“We’re trying to do everything we can to find people alive,” Sanket said.
Sanket also has a family member, who works as a guide for the company, among the missing.
Sanket’s father, Sagar, founded Himalayan Glacier Adventure and Travel in Nepal in 1992. Sagar got the idea from a trek he completed while in field training as a college student studying geology, according to Sanket.
Inspired by the mountainous landscape and people he met along the way, Sagar dropped out of school so he could help other people experience what he did.
The company started with offering trips to Nepal and has branched out to Tanzania and Peru, Sanket said. It specializes in cultural tours and adventure travel.
Sanket, after graduating from Towson University with a degree in finance, helped his family establish their business in Baltimore in 2019.
It made sense to expand to the U.S. because most of their clientele was coming from North America, he said.
Sanket said the company never imagined something so catastrophic would happen.
“I do believe in miracles,” he said, “but every passing it probably just dwindles.”
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