A press briefing in Gyirong town on Aug. 30 said the Aug. 26 event began with a
landslide on the Nepal side and caused major casualties and missing persons at
Gyirong port in Gyirong County, Shigatse, Tibet. Authorities attributed the
disaster to long-term glacier destabilization linked to climate warming,
describing it as sudden with large peak flow, high velocity, strong destructive
power and wide impact—features increasingly observed across the Tibetan Plateau
cryosphere. Monitoring showed the ice-rock collapse reached and struck China’s
Gyirong port in roughly 6–7 minutes from initiation.