Authorities in Nepal mistakenly announced that a British aid worker had been rescued, confusing him with a survivor of the devastating flash floods that struck the country last week.
Former Gloucester councillor Alastair Chambers, 45, explained that the mix-up occurred when he arrived back in the capital, Kathmandu, on a humanitarian aid flight following volunteer work in a remote village.
Officials in Nepal had declared on Tuesday that a British national was rescued from the country’s Rasuwa region.
In a Facebook statement, the Nepali Army confirmed that 119 people, among them a British citizen, were brought to safety through air operations.
However, Mr Chambers stated that he had travelled to the area specifically to assist with relief work and was never saved as part of any official rescue effort.
open image in galleryAfter spending several days in a village alongside the Trishuli river in central Nepal, he returned to Kathmandu aboard a humanitarian aid helicopter.
He said: “I got in the helicopter, the humanitarian aid helicopter, and I got dropped off at the army barracks, and when I got dropped off one of the police officers came up to me and asked for my details.
“Then they presumed that I’d been rescued. It’s been a bit of a weird one, really.
“I gave them my details, just abiding by the rules, and they obviously thought that I’d been rescued.
“News spreads – I was contacted by about 15 different journalists in the last few hours, just asking how I was and how I’m feeling after being rescued, and I had to say: ‘Well sorry, I haven’t been rescued.’”
“I thought they seemed very happy when I arrived,” he added.
Mr Chambers flew to Nepal last week after seeing the devastation wreaked by the floods on the news.
Together with other volunteers, he distributed sleeping bags, water purification tools, food and essentials to communities cut off by collapsed bridges, travelling to the area by helicopter.
Mr Chambers said: “It’s quite dangerous, and we’ve got a lot of landslides, trees across the roads in front of us.
open image in gallery“To take a journey that should take about one and a half hours, took about eight or nine hours in the end.
“We made our way there and then had a flood scare first thing in the morning.
“We’d been told that the floods were coming again… so we made our way up the mountain.
“Thankfully, it wasn’t large as the other torrent of water, so we waited until that settled and then made our way down and helped locate bodies and deliver humanitarian aid for the last few days.
“It’s been quite challenging, but it’s been very rewarding as well.”
Mr Chambers plans to fly back to the UK to raise money for the devastated village before returning with essentials and to set up solar powered lighting.
On Tuesday, Foreign Office minister Lord Wood of Anfield told the House of Lords that 36 British people are currently unaccounted for, up from the previous total of 33.
Minister for the Indo-Pacific, Baroness Winterton, will visit Nepal’s capital Kathmandu from Wednesday to Thursday to discuss support for recovery efforts, the Foreign Office said.
During her visit, Baroness Winterton will meet Nepali and UN officials, as well as embassy staff and members of the UK’s rapid deployment team, which is supporting the families of British nationals.
Foreign Office minister Stephen Doughty will meet members of the British-Nepali community in London on Wednesday, to discuss the support available for those affected.
The UK Government has promised £5 million of humanitarian support support for relief and recovery efforts.