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Unreinforced Masonry buildings (URMs) were the most prevalent construction practice in the rural areas of Nepal. During the 2015 Gorkha earthquake, most of these buildings suffered critical damage. Consequently, after the disaster, National Reconstruction Authority (NRA) was established to provide technical and financial assistance in the reconstruction process. This paper provides a qualitative framework for the assessment of masonry residential buildings in rural areas, considering the NRA minimum requirement, with Bhalche, Nuwakot as the study area. Rapid Visual Screening (RVS) and Key Informant Survey (KIS) were used to study, inspect and collect data and obtained results are compared with NRA minimum guidelines and Codal provisions. The study focuses only on a small but representative sample of reconstructed buildings rather than every building, with how and why of a particular issue rather than how many. The examination found that the reconstructed buildings in Bhalche have minor noncompliance issues, while significant noncompliance issues are found in all the houses constructed before the Government of Nepal's(GON) initiatives for reconstruction by the local people themselves using available local resources and existing knowledge. The KIS and RVS results are supported by case study examples and photos, respectively. The study also reviews the current building typology in Bhalche and attempts to delineate the rationale contributing to the undesired discrepancy in reconstructed buildings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main objective of this research is to prepare inundation map of a section of Babai Basin and to find out the inundated areas for different return periods. In order to achieve the objectives, Geographic Information System (GIS) and HEC-RAS along with HEC-GeoRAS extension were used as tools. Coordinates were used as primary parameter and were obtained from survey to generate geometric data such as Triangular Irregular Networks (TIN), streamline, river bank and flow paths. After importing the geometry data into HEC-RAS, hydraulic modelling was applied by using flow data as main input. As a result, the watershed area of the Babai basin has been successfully modelled and map showing the flooded areas along the Babai basin has been delineated. The flooded area was geometrically overlaid on the topographic map to outline the affected areas. The area under the influence of the flood were assessed which shows that about 49% of total inundated areas comprises farming land. Also a sensitivity analysis was performed to predict the change in percentage of flooded areas when Maning's parameter was increased by 10% and when kept same in both banks and channel. However, differences in figure of inundated areas are insignificant to variations made in Maning's n. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]