SOM NATH BASTOLA BIRD'S EYE VIEW: The East-West Highway was the only dry ground for many fleeing the Kosi floods in Sunsari in this picture taken from a rescue helicopter on Wednesday.

18 August, 7.30 AM: Four of us were crammed in a car that was stuck in a long queue at Jamuna Chok near the welcome gate of the Kosi Tapu Wildlife Reserve.

The Kosi was in full spate, its waters were threatening the eastern embankment. Locals had blocked the road to force the administration to repair the levee. They were also angry that the Indians, who control the barrage at the border downstream, hadn't opened the sluice gates.

Drivers were pleading with the locals to let them go. Suddenly, the people at the barricades scattered. Far off, we saw water surging out of a breach in the embankment. Our driver put the jeep into high gear and we sped at 140km/h towards the barrage, racing the rushing waters. We crossed the barrage and noticed that the Indians had opened only half the 56 sluice gates.

NT August 2003, #157

It was only when we got to the western side of the river that we felt safe. Six hours later, we were in Hetauda, where we heard the news on the local FM station: 50,000 villagers displaced by the breach in the Kosi embankment. An entire 5km section of the East-West Highway had been washed away where we were stuck.

Water experts have been warning a possible breach of the Kosi embankments for decades. Less serious levee collapses have happened eight times. The root of the problem is that the Kosi Barrage, built to control floods in the 1960s, was a colossal engineering mistake. It may have regulated flood waters for the first few years, but sediment deposits over the years has caused the Kosi to now flow three metres above the surrounding land.

When the sluice gates are not opened at the border by the Indians, the impounded water in Nepal endangers the levees. This week, the river broke through a weak point in the 12km eastern embankment.

Water expert Ajaya Dixit says the focus should be on drainage, not river control. "By blocking a river's path to the sea, you make the situation worse, we must try to manage the river, not control it," he explained.

The Kosi has migrated 150 km westwards since 1730, and could easily go back to its original course in a year with heavy monsoon. That would make the river bypass the barrage altogether, take it past Biratnagar, and make this week's flood seem like a picnic.

The other problem is the lack of coordination between Nepal and India in managing the border barrage. "The embankments are weak and there is no maintenance," says Deb Narayan Yadav of the Kosi Pidit Samaj, "The decision to open the sluice gates has to come from Patna."

SOM NATH BASTOLA The army's Puma helicopter picks up villagers marooned in flooded homes on Wednesday, two days after the floods struck.

SOM NATH BASTOLA Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal and MJF leader Upendra Yadav had a difficult time assuring people displaced by the floods in Sunsari of government relief.