33 Glacial Lakes Put 7.1 Million Pakistanis at Risk
Nadeem Tanoli
ISLAMABAD: High in Pakistan’s mountain ranges, thousands of glacial lakes hold enormous volumes of water behind fragile natural barriers. For communities living downstream, the danger is not always visible, and when one of these lakes bursts, there may be only minutes to escape.
Pakistan has 13,032 mapped glaciers and more than 3,000 glacial lakes, according to a briefing given to a Senate committee. Of these lakes, 33 have been identified as dangerous, with sudden outbursts potentially threatening around 7.1 million people in Gilgit-Baltistan and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
The warning has brought renewed attention to a growing challenge: Pakistan is not only facing the physical threat of Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (GLOFs), but also weaknesses in the systems designed to warn vulnerable communities before the water arrives.
When minutes can make difference
A GLOF can develop with alarming speed. A senior official told the committee that communities downstream may have only 15 to 30 minutes between an outburst and the arrival of floodwaters.
That makes early warning systems critical.
But officials from the Gilgit-Baltistan Disaster Management Authority said some of the systems installed to provide those warnings are themselves facing technical problems.
A total of 174 early warning systems have been provided in Gilgit-Baltistan, including river gauges, lake gauges, rain gauges and weather stations. Of these, 151 are currently installed, officials said.
However, sensors and communication SIMs have reportedly experienced problems during cloudy weather, the very conditions in which reliable monitoring can become particularly important.
The region’s main monitoring dashboard is operated by the PMD, and officials told the committee that information can sometimes take two to three hours to reach provincial authorities.
For a flood that may reach communities within half an hour, such a delay can become critical.
Gilgit-Baltistan officials therefore called for real-time access to warning data, allowing district administrations to issue alerts and conduct evacuation procedures without waiting for information to pass through multiple departments.
A landscape under pressure
The risk extends across some of Pakistan’s most remote and mountainous areas.
Officials said Gilgit-Baltistan has around 171 high-risk valleys, many of them located beneath glaciers and glacial lakes.
A SUPARCO study conducted in August 2026 examined 115 lakes across Gilgit-Baltistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Of the 24 glacial lakes identified for detailed risk assessment, five were classified as high danger, 10 as medium danger and nine as low danger.
The five high-danger lakes were located in Astore, Ghizer and Hunza.
Meanwhile, officials reported that more than 100 flood events associated with widespread melting occurred across Gilgit-Baltistan during 2025 and 2026.
The consequences have already been severe.
In Tormik, around 800 households were cut off from the rest of the region for almost two weeks, forcing authorities to deliver supplies by helicopter.
During 2025, officials reported 41 deaths, 52 injuries, more than 800 completely destroyed houses and around 400 partially damaged houses.
In 2026, reported damage included 525 houses, around 1,000 livestock, 31 bridges, 41 headworks and approximately 636 kilometres of roads.
Preparing for a flood that may come without warning
Some measures have already been taken to protect communities.
Authorities have constructed 48 safe havens across 10 districts, along with 17 community-based disaster risk management centres and protective walls in 16 valleys.
Many of the safe havens are government buildings, including schools located on higher ground. Communities are expected to move there during a GLOF, flash flood or cloudburst after participating in evacuation drills.
But infrastructure alone may not be enough if warnings do not reach communities in time.
The committee was told that Pakistan currently lacks a single dedicated national institution responsible for regularly assessing GLOF lakes.
This has created a fragmented system in which different institutions oversee different parts of the problem.
The Ministry of Water Resources and WAPDA deal with glaciers and water systems, the Pakistan Meteorological Department handles weather monitoring, SUPARCO works on satellite-related information, while NDMA is responsible for disaster management.
The government has now formed a committee to work on integrating these areas.
Can technology close warning gap?
One proposal under discussion is a shared digital platform through which relevant institutions could exchange information in real time.
Officials also proposed developing a unified national glacier inventory, hazard mapping, satellite and drone monitoring, artificial intelligence and machine-learning tools, digital information systems and community-based warning networks.
Satellite imagery can help identify and monitor glacial lakes, but officials noted an important limitation: satellite images cannot provide complete information about the depth of a lake.
Understanding the volume of water behind a natural barrier, and the strength of that barrier, is crucial to determining how dangerous a lake may be.
Officials said regular assessments should therefore examine not only the size of lakes but also the stability of the natural barriers holding them back.
The water beneath glaciers
The concern is larger than the immediate threat of floods.
The Hindu Kush, Karakoram and Himalaya region contains 13,032 mapped glaciers, according to the briefing, and more than 200 million people downstream depend on water originating from these glaciers.
Pakistan’s per-person water availability has fallen dramatically, from around 5,800 cubic metres in 1950 to less than 850 cubic metres in 2025.
At the same time, an estimated 60 to 70 percent of the Indus River system’s flow comes from snow and glacier melt.
A climate briefing cited an ICIMOD study that found Pakistan’s wider glacier reserves had declined by nearly 9 percent between 2010 and 2020. Officials also reported a continuing decline in seasonal snow patterns between 2023 and 2026.
This creates a difficult paradox: glaciers are essential to Pakistan’s water supply, but their changing behaviour can also increase risks for communities living beneath them.
Warning systems already in place
UNDP officials told the committee that 246 warning stations had been handed over to the Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD).
The average number functioning at a given time was reported to be between 210 and 225.
The stations use satellite and 4G connections, while satellite communication is used in locations where 4G coverage is unavailable.
The challenge now is to ensure that these systems remain operational when they are needed most.
From mountain villages to safer ground
Beyond monitoring and technology, officials also highlighted the need for better land-use planning in Gilgit-Baltistan.
Communities located in areas identified as highly vulnerable could potentially be relocated to safer locations. Digital modelling could also help authorities predict the likely path of floodwaters from identified GLOF sites.
For residents living beneath these lakes, however, the most important question remains simple: will the warning reach them before the water does?
Pakistan’s growing GLOF challenge is therefore not only about glaciers, lakes or climate change. It is also about the speed at which information travels—from a mountain sensor to a government dashboard, from officials to villages, and finally from an alert to an evacuation.
When the window for survival may be measured in minutes, every delay matters.
