Priya Adhikari Flies 100 Rescue Missions in Flood-Hit Nepal

By: Women Entrepreneurs Review Team | Wednesday, 2 September 2026

Amid floods and landslides continuing to wreak havoc in Nepal, Priya Adhikari, the first female helicopter captain of the country, is playing a pivotal role in the rescue mission. The 41-year-old pilot has been flying in the worst-hit areas at high altitude incessantly for days rescuing stranded people washed away in the disaster.

So far, Priya has been involved in 100 rescues in less than a week, conquering challenging and risky conditions of flying and transporting victims from difficult terrains. She has flown in multiple affected zones such as Timure in Rasuwa district. This rescue mission had pilots face tough working conditions in transporting survivors to safety and supporting recovery efforts on the ground.

Key Highlights:

• Priya Adhikari completes around 100 rescue missions flood-hit Nepal in less than a week
• Nepal’s first female helicopter captain flies into high-risk disaster zones
• Priya conducts high-altitude rescues amid floods and landslides

Priya shared that in a few regions conditions are extremely volatile as pilots cannot afford to shut down the engines of their helicopters once they land there. They need to maintain the helicopter’s power as they load the survivors on. Although such a practice helps them take off fast in case of any changes on the ground, it also increases the difficulty level for both the pilots as well as the rescue team.

For her, however, the hardest part of the entire process is witnessing the destruction scale firsthand from air. She explained how she had seen large amount of debris and countless corpses scattered on the ground while on the other side there were survivors waiting to be rescued. In such conditions, every flight becomes even more difficult and complicated to execute.

The scope of rescue operations in Nepal has put great pressure on pilots operating helicopters in the most affected areas. Around 20 helicopters are being used in rescue operations in the vicinity of Timure, flying in the same narrow space. According to her, the narrow valley path poses danger when many helicopters come in at one time. Therefore, proper coordination through radio by the pilots regarding the flights, distance to be kept from other aircrafts, and the helicopter to land becomes vital.

Priya’s profession as a high-altitude female pilot is fuelled by years of performing search and rescue operations in the Himalayas; one of the most difficult regions of the world. Her assignments have frequently involved reaching people in locations that are difficult to access by ground, including injured climbers stranded at extreme elevations.

Flying at such high altitudes demands extensive flight experience and the ability to adapt to the quickly changing mountain weather. Priya has even conducted few rescues at an elevation of up to 6,200 metres.

Priya shared the above information in an interview with CNN and expressed the recent floods as one of the toughest rescue efforts she had experienced in her entire career. According to her, this challenge is even greater than what she experienced when dealing with Nepal earthquake in 2015, mainly due to the damage into small valley areas.