Indian rescuers say very close to reaching 41 men trapped in tunnel

SILKYARA, India – Rescuers in India are just 6m or 7m away from 41 men trapped in a collapsed highway tunnel in the Himalayas for more than two weeks, and are confident of drilling through to reach them on Nov 28, officials said.

The men, low-wage workers from India’s poorest states, have been stuck in the 4.5km tunnel in Uttarakhand state since it collapsed on Nov 12.

So-called rat miners, brought in on Nov 27 to drill through the rocks and gravel by hand after machinery failed, made good progress overnight, officials said.

“About 6 or 7 metres are left,” said Mr Deepak Patil, a senior officer leading the rescue, adding that more than 50m of an estimated 60m of debris had been bored through.

“Sure, 100 per cent,” he said when asked if the men could be reached on Nov 28.

The men have been getting food, water, light, oxygen and medicines through a pipe but efforts to dig a tunnel to reach and rescue them with drilling machines have been frustrated by a series of snags.

Rescuers on Nov 27 brought in the “rat miners”, experts at a primitive, hazardous and controversial method used mostly to get at coal deposits through narrow passages. Their name comes from their resemblance to burrowing rats.

The tunnel is part of the US$1.5 billion (S$2 billion) Char Dham highway, one of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s most ambitious projects, aimed at connecting four Hindu pilgrimage sites through an 890km network of roads.

Authorities have not said what caused the cave-in, but the region is prone to landslides, earthquakes and floods. REUTERS