Fact Check: Did Religious Conflict Trigger the Nepal-Tibet Border Floods?

September 3, 2026 | 04:31 am

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Since August 28, 2026, various social media accounts have claimed that the massive floods along the Nepal-Tibet border were an act of divine retribution. It was alleged that the disaster occurred because Muslims in Nepal frequently face discrimination and persecution. These accounts included videos depicting religious conflict and the vandalism of places of worship—such as those shared by Account 1 [archive] and Account 2 on Facebook, as well as Account 3 and Account 4 on Instagram and X. The content circulated after flash floods struck the border region on Wednesday, August 26, 2026.

Did the floods at the Nepal-Tibet border occur due to religious issues?

FACT CHECK

Tempo verified the content using reverse image searches and confirmation from credible sources. The findings indicate that the flash floods at the Nepal-Tibet border were unrelated to religious issues; the disaster was triggered by the collapse of a glacier tongue at an altitude of 5,200 meters above sea level. The accompanying videos were a compilation of unrelated events from various countries.

Causes of the Flash Flood in Nepal-Tibet

Daryono, a member of the Indonesian Society of Disaster Experts, explained that the collapsed glacier tongue covered an area of 200,000 square meters. Satellite imagery shows a massive ice mass plunging 1,200 meters vertically, crashing into the Bhote Koshi and Trishuli Rivers.

The US Geological Survey (USGS) seismic sensor network initially registered the event as a magnitude 5.2 tectonic earthquake. The ice-rock avalanche triggered high-speed friction between ice fragments, soft sediment, and volcanic valley rock, resulting in a dense debris flow.

Daryono likens the flow to liquid concrete sweeping across the landscape at speeds exceeding 75 kilometers per hour. "This is not merely an ordinary overflow of water, but the collapse of a natural stability system in a zone of extreme elevation," Daryono stated in writing to Tempo on Saturday, August 29, 2026.

According to Daryono, the massive ice mass broke away due to the degradation of permafrost caused by rising air temperatures and the percolation of glacial meltwater.

Video Verification

Video footage showing a torrent of water rushing through a hillside town corresponds to the landslide that struck Atami-Izusan, Japan, in 2021. A Japanese-language X account, @d_t_dcg_sdh, uploaded a similar video on July 3, 2021. NHK reported that at least two people died and many residents were missing after heavy rains triggered a landslide in the city of Atami, Shizuoka Prefecture.

The flood footage shown between the 01:05 and 01:13 marks matches a video posted by the X account @accuweather on December 27, 2023, from Catamarca, Argentina. A bridge was swept away by the current on Christmas Day, leaving a town isolated.

“A bridge was swept away in Catamarca, Argentina, on Christmas Day, completely isolating a town,” the account wrote.

A reverse image search confirms that the clip at the 01:28 mark has been circulating on X since September 29, 2024. The clip shows damage caused by Hurricane Helene in North Carolina, United States.

In addition to the video clips mentioned above, the Instagram account @sahabatsurga shared a clip of a man climbing a mosque minaret. The incident took place in New Delhi, India, in February 2020 during riots in Ashok Nagar linked to protests against a new law. The Telegraph's YouTube channel uploaded the footage on March 1, 2020.

In February 2020, violence erupted in Ashok Nagar, northeast Delhi, during protests against a new law introduced by the Hindu nationalist party led by Narendra Modi.

Rioters attacked and looted a mosque in the area. They also climbed to the top of the mosque's minaret, damaged it, and hoisted both their organization's flag and the national flag at the summit.

A video clip of a flash flood posted by the Instagram account @daionlineofficial traces back to content shared by The Times of India on August 5, 2025. The video caption describes damage caused by heavy rains in Uttarakhand, India—details corroborated by reports from Reuters, the BBC, Al Jazeera, The Hindu, and other outlets.

CONCLUSION

Tempo’s verification concludes that the claim linking the video of the Nepal flood to religion is false.

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