By Shishir Prashant 
PrashantNews
After a series of cloudbursts in the western Himalayas, flash floods struck Tharali area in Chamoli district of Uttarakhand shortly after midnight on Saturday, top officials said.
One person was dead and another went missing in their sleep as floods and debris from Toonari stream, a tributary of Pindar river, created havoc damaging over 2 dozen houses and some market areas in Tharali. Some vehicles were also damaged.
The body of a 20 year old girl has been recovered by the rescue teams. The rescuers were trying to find the missing person.
Six persons who were seriously injured in the disaster were shifted to AIIMS Rishikesh for better medical care.
Rescue operations by the Army, ITBP, SDRF, NDRF, police aided by other local agencies were in full swing.
Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami was continuously monitoring the situation and has asked the district administration to provide all possible help to the affected people.
An official statement said relief and rescue operations are being carried out on a war footing amid the debris in Tharali market and surrounding areas. On the instructions of the Chief Minister, various teams of District Administration, Local Police, SDRF, NDRF, Army, SSB, ITBP are engaged in relief and rescue operations.
The Chief Minister himself is monitoring the rescue operation and is constantly taking updates from Chief Secretary Anand Bardhan, Secretary Disaster Management and Rehabilitation Vinod Kumar Suman and District Magistrate Chamoli Sandeep Tiwari, the statement said. He also announced a compensation of Rs 5 lakh each to the next of kin of deceased. For the fully damaged houses, the compensation will be Rs 5 lakh.
In the past two months, a series of disasters mostly due to cloudbursts and incessant rains have triggered flash floods in Jammu, Himachal and Uttarakhand leaving a big trail of death and destruction. In most of the disasters, small streams turned monstrous destroying everything that came in their way. Scientists were also closely studying these disasters to suggest long term measures to the governments.
Significantly, the destruction mainly occurred in the floodplains of these streams where structures like hotels and houses mushroomed in the past one decade.
