Nepal’s army said more than 4,000 people had been rescued, with helicopters, motorboats and rafts bringing stranded people to safety.
Nilkantha Pandey of the humanitarian organisation CARE Nepal said many of those affected by the floods needed safe drinking water and temporary housing.
“Mostly informal settlements have been affected,” Pandey said. “It is time to respond and not delay.”
“AN EXTREME EVENT”
Merchants in Kathmandu said damage to intercity roads had drastically cut the supply of fresh fruit and vegetables into the capital.
“The farmers have their produce ready but with the highways blocked, all of it is stuck,” Binay Shrestha, who works at one of the city’s main produce markets, told AFP.
Nepal’s weather bureau said their preliminary data measured record-breaking rain in the 24 hours to Saturday morning.
A monitoring station at Kathmandu airport recorded about 240 millimetres of rain, the highest figure since 2002.
