Expert on glacier collapse in Nepal

Bodo Bookhagen answered questions from journalists at Deutschlandfunk and T-Online about the causes of the devastating glacier collapse on August 26, 2026. The professor at the Institute of Geosciences is an expert on sediment transport in permafrost and glacial areas of the Himalayan region and, as a co-author of a 2021 Science article, had already highlighted the increasing risk of flooding and mudslides due to climate change. “The new satellite images provide clues as to how the disaster may have unfolded,” he explained to the media on Thursday afternoon. “A section of mountain and glacier slope several hundred meters in size—about 500 by 800 meters—may have broken off and plunged into the depths, where it mixed with sediment and then raced downhill at high speed.”