The family of an Augusta woman missing since the April 25 earthquake in Nepal acknowledged in a Facebook post Tuesday morning that she is likely dead.

“Although she is still missing and unaccounted for, six weeks has passed since the devastating event that has broken our hearts,” wrote Khaled and Yasmine Habash, the adult children of Dawn Habash. “Our search and rescue mission in the area showed great loss, not only for ourselves but for the many hundreds of people effected (sic) around the world and within Langtang valley.”

Dawn Habash, 57, a yoga instructor from Augusta, was hiking in Nepal when a massive earthquake rocked the country, killing at least 8,000 people and injuring thousands more.

Her body has not been found.

After another spate of avalanches, the daughter of the Augusta woman missing after last month’s Nepal earthquake has been forced to evacuate the area near where her mother was traveling.

That ends, for now, the family’s on-the-ground search for Dawn Habash, the 57-year-old yoga instructor who was last seen by a hiking companion in the area of Langtang on April 25, the day of the earthquake that killed at least 8,000 and injured thousands more.

Before the earthquake, Habash reportedly planned to go to Langtang village, along the Asian country’s border with Tibet, an area that was largely destroyed in the quake. She hasn’t been found.

On Sunday, Nepalese media reported that rescue teams were evacuating villagers as aftershocks from the earthquake caused more avalanches.

Earlier this month, Habash’s daughter, Yasmine, left for Nepal with her boyfriend to search for her mother. But with aftershocks causing avalanches just above Langtang village, the pair was forced to leave. They’re now safe in Kathmandu, the country’s capital, and could return to the U.S. by week’s end, according to Yasmine Habash’s brother, Khaled, of Portland.

When asked if that ends the family’s search, he said, “I don’t want to say yes, but that might be the scenario.” He said his sister would have stayed longer if she weren’t ordered out for safety reasons.

“I don’t know what there is to do,” he said. “We’re all heartbroken, but she can’t be in a dangerous place.”

Khaled Habash said he wanted to thank people who have supported the family’s effort to find their mother. That included national media appearances and an online fundraising campaign that raised nearly $26,000. He said the money not used for expenses will go to efforts to search for and assist victims in Nepal.

Dawn Habash grew up in Gardiner, and her trip to Nepal was part of a sabbatical that started with a trip to India, where Dawn and Yasmine spent five weeks together. Yasmine returned to her home in Alaska on March 20, and her mother went to Nepal to hike and meditate. She was scheduled to come back to Maine May 7.

On that day, Khaled Habash’s wife gave birth to a daughter, Zinnia. One of her two middle names is Dawn. He said it’s “difficult to be happy” under the circumstances, but he sees it as a sign.

“It’s really intense, but there’s no other way to think about it other than a reincarnation or a rebirth,” he said. “This little girl’s going to save us from all the heartbreak we’ve been going through.”

Michael Shepherd — 370-7652

mshepherd@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @mikeshepherdme

The daughter of the Augusta woman missing since last month’s earthquake in Nepal is safe in the country’s capital following another quake that hit the country Tuesday, killing at least 37 people and injuring more than 1,000.

Yasmine Habash left for Nepal more than a week ago with her boyfriend, Reid Harris, to search for her mother, who was last seen on April 25 by a hiking companion in the area of Langtang, a village largely destroyed by the earthquake that day.

Dawn Habash, a 57-year-old yoga instructor who grew up in Gardiner, hasn’t been found.

Yasmine Habash’s brother, Khaled, posted an update Tuesday morning to the Facebook page created for the search, saying his sister and her boyfriend were safe in Kathmandu, the Himalayan nation’s capital. Aftershocks from the first earthquake had forced Yasmine Habash and her boyfriend to end the search and evacuate the area near where her mother had been traveling.

In an email Tuesday, Yasmine Habash said it’s been a difficult week, and she’s not ready to send any updates.

Peter Prindle, an anthropologist who lives in Waterville and has studied Nepal for decades, said more than half of the people affected by the earthquakes will likely not receive financial aid or help because their communities are isolated and difficult to reach. As has happened in the past, aid will likely reach the larger population centers and more wealthy areas, he said.

Prindle taught at Colby College and his wife, Tamae Prindle, is a professor of East Asian language and Japanese literature at the college.

Many of Nepal’s people live in remote rural communities and are used to relying on themselves, Prindle said.

“For most of them, they can cope,” he said. “They’re used to crop failures. They’re used to a lot of sort of basic problems.”

The country has virtually no modern industry and much of its economy comes from remittances, money transferred from friends and relatives working in other countries, Prindle said.

In 2014, Nepal was tied for third in countries with the highest percentage of gross domestic product from remittances at 25 percent, according to the World Bank. That is nearly double the country’s revenue from exports of goods and services.

Prindle, who was in the first Peace Corps group to travel in Nepal in 1962, has been in contact with friends who live there.

None of his friends there was killed by the earthquakes, but a contact living in a village near Lukla, east of Kathmandu and south of Mount Everest, said Tuesday’s earthquake finished off many of the buildings damaged in last month’s quake.

Prindle said Langtang, the village where Habash was last seen on the day of the earthquake, received so much damage from an avalanche because the surrounding area is very steep.

“It doesn’t look good,” he said of the chances of finding Habash.

Around 200 bodies are believed to be buried beneath rock and snow in Langtang Village, according to Reuters. On Sunday, officials suspended the search for bodies there because of the continuing avalanche risk.

Khaled Habash, of Portland, told the Kennebec Journal on Monday that he didn’t want to say the search for his mother was over but admitted that might be the case. His sister would have stayed longer to search if she wasn’t evacuated from that area for safety reasons, he said.

“I don’t know what there is to do,” Khaled Habash said. “We’re all heartbroken, but she can’t be in a dangerous place.”

The magnitude 7.3 earthquake that hit Tuesday caused the most damage in districts northeast of the capital, according to the Associated Press. At least 37 people were killed and more than 1,100 were injured, according to the Home Ministry, but officials and aid workers said they expected the death toll to rise.

The magnitude 7.8 quake that struck last month, Nepal’s worst recorded earthquake since 1934, killed more than 8,150 and left hundreds of thousands homeless.

Paul Koenig — 621-5663

pkoenig@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @pdkoenig

The daughter of an Augusta hiker missing in Nepal after a massive earthquake planned to fly with her boyfriend Sunday night to the country to look for her mother.

The family of Dawn Habash, a 57-year-old yoga instructor, hasn’t heard from her since April 17, when she was setting out on a hike in the Langtang region of the south Asian country, north of the capital city, Kathmandu, and along Nepal’s border with China. That region was devastated by an earthquake on April 25. It triggered avalanches that killed many in the Langtang region. The death toll is in the thousands and is expected to rise higher.

Dawn Habash’s daughter, Yasmine, who lives in Juneau, Alaska, but recently has been staying in Maine, said she would fly on Sunday from Boston to Nepal with her boyfriend, Reid Harris. She said they’re planning to conduct an on-the-ground search-and-rescue mission when they get there.

“They are having success in finding people, whether they’re alive or not, unfortunately,” Yasmine Habash said. “That’s what I needed, and I couldn’t wait in Maine anymore.”

The family is getting more and more information about Dawn Habash’s possible whereabouts at the time of the quake. Yasmine said they have spoken with an Italian woman who survived the earthquake and hiked with Dawn Habash on the day of the earthquake and had taken pictures of her the day before. The woman said Dawn Habash hired a trekking porter to accompany her, which the family didn’t know before, according to Yasmine Habash.

She said her mother and the Italian woman planned a hike to a higher elevation on the day of the quake, but Dawn Habash turned around because bad weather had arrived on the mountain. Their plan was to meet later for tea in Langtang village, which the earthquake destroyed by unleashing an avalanche of ice and rock, probably killing hundreds of its residents. The Italian woman never made it there and was rescued, but it’s unknown where Dawn Habash and her porter ended up.

It’s been “an emotional roller coaster” for the family and “things are constantly changing,” Yasmine Habash said. She and her boyfriend have companies and volunteers lined up to help them search, and the family had raised nearly $15,000 as of Sunday afternoon in an online fundraising campaign to pay for travel or hiring professional rescuers. Because of inflated prices, she said, helicopter rescue missions cost as much as $4,000. On Sunday, the Red Barn restaurant on Riverside Drive in Augusta was pledging to donate 50 percent of all of the proceeds it took in between 4 and 6 p.m. and Yasmine said the Down East Emergency Medicine Institute, an Orono charity, has offered help in assembling a dog team.

Yasmine Habash and her brother, Khaled, of Portland, said they’re grateful for support from Maine and beyond via social media; and while the situation may be grim, she said, there’s still a possibility of finding their mother.

“I feel good,” she said. “I feel we are doing every single thing we can, and my mom deserves that and more.”

Michael Shepherd — 370-7652

mshepherd@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @mikeshepherdme

The family of an Augusta woman who was hiking in Nepal at the time of last Saturday’s massive earthquake is holding out hope that she will be found alive, and they are seeking donations to help find her.

Yoga instructor Dawn Habash, 57, last contacted her family April 17 as she was setting out on an eight-to-10-day trek in the Langtang area, which includes Langtang National Park, north of Kathmandu.

More than 6,000 people have been confirmed dead and another 14,000 injured since the 7.8-magnitude quake struck on April 25. Thousands of people are still unaccounted for.

Dawn Habash’s daughter, Yasmine Habash, said her mother is still among the unaccounted for group.

“It’s been confirmed she has not been evacuated,” Yasmine Habash said. “She’s still missing.”

She said a fellow trekker who was evacuated from the area talked to Dawn Habash on the morning of the earthquake in the village of Kayanjin. The rescued trekker said Habash that morning was planning a day trip to higher peaks.

“The weather turned,” Yasmine Habash said. “She may have changed her mind.”

If that happened, Dawn Habash may well have gone to Langtang. According to multiple media reports, the quakes appeared to have wiped out nearly the entire village and its 600 residents, as well as other villages in that area.

“If she was at Langtang Village, that’s not good news,” said Yasmine Habash, who traveled through Nepal with her mother several years ago. “It’s been decimated. … There are, as far as I know, no survivors.”

Yasmine Habash and her brother, Khaled Habash, are desperate for any nuggets of information they can get about their mother. They have called the U.S. Embassy in Nepal at least once a day since then but have not been given details on specific attempts to find her. The siblings also have contacted news outlets, including CNN, which profiled their mother’s story.

Yasmine Habash said embassy officials are “very aware of mom’s high-profile case, and they’ve assured us she’s on the priority list.”

“They know her name and her face,” she said.

Yasmine Habash said the family is in regular contact with online volunteers trying to connect families and with people on the ground conducting the searches. British mountain climber Adrian Hayes is planning to conduct a search in the area Dawn Habash is believed to be in.

“We have pilots who know us and have my mother’s picture,” Yasmine Habash said. “Adrian Hayes has my mother’s picture and is about to do his own independent search.”

The family has established an online fundraising campaign — search “Rescue Dawn Habash in Nepal” at GoFundMe.com — that already had generated more than $7,000 by Friday afternoon. The Red Barn restaurant on Riverside Drive in Augusta will donate 50 percent of all of the proceeds it takes in between 4 and 6 p.m. Sunday.

“We go to the Red Barn a couple of times of year at least,” Yasmine Habash said. “It’s very kind of them to remember us and to know us.”

Yasmine Habash said the money is being collected in case she and her brother need to travel to Nepal or to hire a private search-and-rescue effort. There are currently no specifics plans to do either, but that could change quickly.

“We’re just creating it as preemptive effort for something we may need over the weekend,” Yasmine Habash said. “Time is of the essence at this point. It’s been six days.

“So far we haven’t had any search-and-rescue parties out there. We need more than just helicopter rescue at this point. It sounds like we really need people on the ground searching.”

Yasmine Habash said she and her family are holding out hope that Dawn Habash will contact them, or come home, without using additional resources. She said any money not used to find her mother will be donated to organizations that are conducting the searches or helping to rebuild Nepal.

“This money is going to Nepal, no matter what,” Yasmine Habash said.

Khaled Habash created a Facebook page called “Find Dawn Habash in Nepal After Earthquake 2015” that is dedicated to finding his mother, who is an experienced world traveler on her fourth trip to Nepal.

She was hiking alone, not with an organized tour company, though her family suspects she met and befriended other trekkers along the way.

Dawn Habash grew up in Gardiner and teaches yoga in the Augusta area, both in her own home-based studio, Soul Exposed Yoga, and at other class locations.

Her trip to Nepal is part of a six-month sabbatical, which started with a trip to another favorite destination, India, where Dawn and Yasmine Habash spent five weeks together. At the end of their trip to India, on March 20, Yasmine Habash returned to her home in Alaska while her mother flew to Kathmandu, Nepal, to continue her adventure. The trip was to include trekking and meditating. She had been expected to fly out of Nepal this past Wednesday.

Yasmine Habash has joined her family in Maine since the earthquake. Together they are sharing a vigil they hope will end at any moment with the news that Dawn Habash has been found alive. Yasmine Habash acknowledged that hope is increasingly difficult to grasp.

“There’s space for hope,” she said. “It just seems smaller. Obviously, we should stay positive. It’s easier said than done.”

Craig Crosby — 621-5642

ccrosby@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @CraigCrosby4

The son of an Augusta woman missing in Nepal since the earthquake there April 25 said Wednesday there is no new information on the search for her following news that emergency workers had recovered the bodies of 60 people in the Langtang Valley.

The earthquake triggered a mudslide that buried a village in the valley, popular with tourists, where Dawn Habash, of Augusta, was last seen hiking.

The Associated Press reported that residents of the village, also called Langtang, said Tuesday that as many as 200 people could have been killed by tons of earth and mud unleashed in the devastating quake.

Habash, a 57-year-old yoga instructor from Augusta, was last seen on the day of the earthquake by a hiking companion in the area of Langtang. Habash was not among those found Tuesday.

The Augusta woman’s son, Khaled Habash, of Portland, said Wednesday he has had limited communication with his sister, Yasmine, who left for Nepal on Sunday with her boyfriend to search for their mother. He said she checks in twice a day via email with updates.

Khaled said he had no new information on the search, but he said he feels “stronger” after support from around the world.

He said Yasmine has been in the village of Kyanjin Gompa for 18 hours and plans to retrace her mother’s planned steps back to Langtang village.

The family has gained a lot of attention for their mother’s cause, with Yasmine appearing on CNN, which ran on Wednesday a story about Dawn. An online fundraising effort has gained nearly $24,000, which Yasmine has said will pay for searches and supplies.

The family has said they’re grateful for support from Maine and beyond via social media.

“The whole world will know once we find her,” Khaled Habash said.

Dawn Habash’s family has learned that before the quake, Dawn had planned to meet an Italian woman for tea in Langtang village, but it’s unclear where she ended up.

The Langtang Valley, about 35 miles north of Kathmandu, Nepal’s capital, is now about a two-day hike from the nearest town because the landslide has blocked nearby roads. While helicopters allow easy access, they remain in short supply because of aid missions across parts of Nepal, the Associated Press reported.

Authorities said that up to one-third of Kathmandu’s residents have left since the quake. In the first days, bus stations were jammed with people fearing aftershocks or trying to get home to relatives in devastated villages.

On Tuesday, there were still people waiting for buses to leave.

“I stayed back here to help out my neighbors and clean up the neighborhood,” Surya Singh, who was at a large bus station, told the Associated Press. But now he wants to see the damage in his home village, although with many roads still blocked by landslides, he was unsure whether he could travel all the way by bus.

“The entire village was wiped out by the mudslide. There were some 60 houses there, but they were all buried under rubble. It will be impossible to recover all the bodies,” said Gautam Rimal, the top government official in the Rasuwa district.

The April 25 earthquake killed more than 7,500 people and injured more than 14,000 as it flattened mountain villages and destroyed buildings and archaeological sites in Kathmandu.

KATHMANDU, Nepal — Emergency workers have recovered the bodies of 60 people – including nine foreigners – who were killed when Nepal’s earthquake triggered a mudslide that buried a village in the scenic Langtang Valley popular with tourists.

Residents of the village, also called Langtang, said Tuesday that as many as 200 people could have been killed by tons of earth and mud unleashed in the devastating April 25 quake.

“The entire village was wiped out by the mudslide. There were some 60 houses there, but they were all buried under rubble. It will be impossible to recover all the bodies,” said Gautam Rimal, the top government official in the Rasuwa district.

Dawn Habash, a Maine yoga instructor, was last seen on the day of the earthquake by a hiking companion in the area of Langtang. Habash had not been found Tuesday.

The Langtang Valley, about 35 miles north of Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu, is now about a two-day hike from the nearest town because the landslide has blocked nearby roads.

While helicopters allow easy access, they remain in short supply because of aid missions across parts of Nepal.

The April 25 earthquake killed more than 7,500 people and injured more than 14,000 as it flattened mountain villages and destroyed buildings and archeological sites in Kathmandu.

Authorities say up to one-third of Kathmandu’s residents have left since the quake. In the first days, bus stations were jammed with people fearing aftershocks or trying to get home to relatives in devastated villages.

On Tuesday, there were still people waiting for buses to leave.

“I stayed back here to help out my neighbors and clean up the neighborhood,” said Surya Singh, who was at a large bus station. But now he wants to see the damage in his home village, although with many roads still blocked by landslides, he was unsure if he could get all the way by bus.

AUGUSTA — The family of an Augusta woman hiking in Nepal when a massive earthquake killed thousands there remains hopeful she’ll be found safe, but has not yet been able to reach her in the disaster-torn country.

Dawn Habash, 57, a yoga instructor who lives in Augusta, last communicated with her family April 17 as she was setting out on an eight- to 10-day trek hiking in the Langtang area, which includes Langtang National Park, north of Kathmandu.

Habash’s family, many of whom also live in central Maine, have been unable to reach her since the earthquake and are very worried about her, particularly as the number of people killed by the earthquake and numerous aftershocks continues to climb past 4,000.

Hope for the family comes, in part, from the fact that it’s hard to communicate with anyone in the rural parts of Nepal where she was trekking, and that communication is surely even harder because of the damage wrought by the earthquake which has made travel and communication difficult at best.

“We’re waiting patiently and holding out with positivity that it’s just a lack of communications, of electricity, barring us from reaching her,” said Habash’s daughter, Yasmine Habash, who lives in Alaska but Monday was traveling home to Maine to be with her family. “We’re trying to stay positive. We’re anticipating hearing from her every day. But we haven’t heard from her.”

Multiple media reports say the quakes appeared to have wiped out nearly the entire village of Langtang and its 600 residents, as well as other villages in that area.

Yasmine, who traveled through Nepal with her mom several years ago, said she’d heard an avalanche destroyed the village of Langtang.

The earthquake and avalanches and landslides it brought also knocked out roads and communications infrastructure, so it’s possible Dawn Habash is safe but unable to reach anyone at home or leave the area.

That is what Yasmine and her brother, Khaled Habash, of Portland, hope is all that is preventing their mom from reaching out to them.

“We’re presuming there was a lot of infrastructure damage, which knocked out the ability of people to move,” Yasmine Habash said. “Our family is hoping that is the reason we haven’t heard from her.”

Khaled has contacted the American Red Cross and the U.S. Embassy and posted on a Facebook page established to help find missing people following the Saturday earthquake. His mother is an experienced world traveler on her fourth trip to the impoverished but beautiful, mountainous country of Nepal.

He said his mom communicates with them on an iPad, because cellphone service, even normally, is unreliable in much of Nepal.

She was hiking alone, not with an organized tour company, though her family suspects she met and befriended other trekkers along the way.

Khaled Habash’s post on a Facebook link helping loved ones find people missing in Nepal states, “She is thought to be by herself but we are hoping she had met up with some other trekkers to follow. We are very worried about her and fear she may be hurt and needing assistance. She has trouble with her knees from time to time.”

Throughout the day on Monday, friends posted positive thoughts on Dawn Habash’s Facebook page, saying they are “anxiously awaiting a message from you” and calling her “a very strong person and a survivor.”

Dawn Habash grew up in Gardiner and teaches yoga in the Augusta area, both in her own home-based studio, Soul Exposed Yoga, and at other class locations.

Her trip to Nepal is part of a six-month sabbatical, which started with a trip to another favorite destination, India, where Dawn and Yasmine spent five weeks together. At the end of their trip to India, March 20, Yasmine returned to Alaska while her mom flew to Kathmandu, Nepal, to continue her adventure. The trip was to include trekking and meditating. She was expected to fly out of Nepal April 29.

Yasmine said her mom was drawn to both India and Nepal, places where she found comfort and peace. Both Yasmine and Khaled have traveled in Nepal, hiking the Annapurna mountain range, with their mom before.

“Nepal is a special place to us. It’s amazing,” Yasmine said of the small country and its people. “It has a beautiful tranquility and peace to it, and the people. The nature of the people there is so amazing, it keeps taking you back there.”

Yasmine said those who wish to help the family and Dawn Habash may send their prayers, good thoughts and positivity. She noted there are numerous ways people can donate to help the people of Nepal recover from the natural disaster.

She said the country is devastated, and conditions there are poor.

“Nepal needs help, so the country and people can recover from the earthquake,” Yasmine Habash said.

Keith Edwards — 621-5647

kedwards@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @kedwardskj