By Aamir Latif
ISLAMABAD
At least 174 people are missing and around 200 people are trapped in Pakistan's northern mountaineer 'Deosai' glacier site as massive snowfall which continued over the last three days has blanketed the region, local officials said.
Around 200 people, including women and children, are trapped in the Charagah area of Deosai while 252 people were rescued Saturday night, Tariq Hussein a local administration official told reporters.
Many among the rescued people are injured as the region faces an unseasonal amount of snowfall, the official said. The trapped and missing people are mostly shepherds and their families who move with their herds during the season.
"Rescue teams are facing difficulties in carrying out operations due to a layer of three to four feet of snow in the affected area," he said, adding that rescue operations are carried out at night when the show hardens and the bulldozers and other vehicles can move on the hardened ground.
The Deosai Glacier, though treacherous by nature and located at a height of 13,500 feet in the Karakoram range, attracts hundreds of local and foreign trackers every year. The region usually receives seasonal snowfall after September 15, but this year, it unexpectedly struck two weeks before which environmentalists see as a result of climate change.
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