UTTARKASHI, India — All 41 construction workers trapped in a collapsed mountain tunnel in northern India for more than two weeks were pulled out Tuesday, ending a protracted rescue mission that gripped the country for days.
Locals, relatives and government officials rejoiced, lit firecrackers and shouted “Bharat Mata ki Jai” — Hindi for “Long live mother India — as smiling workers began to emerge from the tunnel entrance.
Officials hung a wreath around the neck of the first rescued worker as the crowd cheered.
Nitin Gadkari, the country’s road transport and highways minister, said in a video posted on social media platform X that he was “really relieved and happy” after all the workers were rescued from the Silkyara Tunnel in the northern Indian city of Uttarkashi. following an ordeal for 17 days.
“This was a well-coordinated effort by various agencies, marking one of the most important rescue operations in recent years,” Gadkari said.
No one was seriously injured or killed when the tunnel collapsed in the early morning hours of Nov. 12.
Workers follow their rescue from inside the Silkyara tunnel under construction on the Brahmakal Yamunotri National Highway in Uttarkashi, India. UTTARAKHAND INFORMATION DEPARTMENT Circulation/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock “This was a well-coordinated effort by multiple agencies, marking one of the most important rescue operations in recent years,” said Nitin Gadkari, the country’s road transport and highways minister. UTTARAKHAND INFORMATION DEPARTMENT Circulation/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
The workers are finishing their shifts and many are likely looking forward to celebrating Diwali, the festival of lights, that day.
From the beginning of their ordeal, the workers were supplied with food, water and oxygen through pipes, and they emerged in good health, officials said. They were extracted one by one on wheeled stretchers pulled through a welded pipe tunnel about a meter wide (the width of a yard) that crews had pushed through collapsed soil and rock.
Before appearing in front of the cameras and the crowd and being taken away in an ambulance, each worker was given a check-up at a makeshift medical camp at the tunnel entrance.
Devender, a rescuer who gave only his first name, told New Delhi Television that “the trapped workers were very happy when they saw us in the tunnel. Some rushed to me and hugged me.”
A massive rescue mission has left many struggling. Workers were trapped on November 12, when a landslide caused part of a 4.5-kilometer (2.8-mile) tunnel they were building in Uttarakhand state to collapse about 200 meters (650 feet) from the entrance.
They survive on food and oxygen supplied through narrow steel pipes.
Kirti Panwar, a state government spokeswoman, said about a dozen men had worked overnight to manually dig through rock and debris, taking turns drilling with hand-held drills and clearing dirt in what she said was the last step of the rescue. operation.
Rescuers had to dig manually after a drilling machine broke down on Friday while drilling horizontally from the front because of the mountainous terrain in Uttarakhand. The machine bored through about 47 meters (nearly 154 feet) of the roughly 57-60 meters (nearly 187-196 feet) needed, before rescuers began working by hand to create a path to evacuate the trapped workers.
By Tuesday, they had drilled through more than 58 meters (190 feet). As dusk fell, families of those trapped underground gathered near the crash site, anxiously waiting to see their loved ones emerge from the tunnel.
Among them was Jaimal Singh who said he hoped he would soon see his brother Gabbar Singh, who was trapped inside. “Even nature seems cheerful today … the weather is good. Hopefully this will end soon,” he told news agency Press Trust of India.
Rescuers have inserted pipes into the excavated area and welded them so workers can be taken out on wheeled stretchers.
No one was seriously injured or killed when the tunnel collapsed in the early morning hours of November 12 AP
On Sunday, rescuers also began creating a vertical channel with a newly replaced drilling machine as a contingency plan.
What began as a rescue mission expected to take days has turned into weeks, and officials are hesitant to give a timeline for when it might be completed.
“I just feel good. Drilling on the mountain went perfectly, in the tunnel, it went very well. I’ve never said ‘I feel good’ before,” Arnold Dix, an international tunnel expert who helped with the rescue, told reporters at the site earlier Tuesday.
Most of the trapped workers are foreign workers from all over the country. Many of their families have traveled to the location, where they have been camping for several days to get updates on the rescue efforts and in the hope of seeing their relatives soon.
Rescuers have inserted pipes into the excavated area and welded them so workers can be taken out on wheeled stretchers. AP They survive on food and oxygen supplied through narrow steel pipes. Department of Information and Public Relations (DIPR) Uttarakhand/AFP via Getty Images
During the operation, trapped workers were supplied with hot food through a 6-inch (15 centimeter) pipe after days of surviving only on dry food delivered through a narrower pipe. They get oxygen through separate pipes, and more than a dozen doctors, including a psychiatrist, are on site, monitoring their health.
The tunnel the workers are building is designed as part of the Chardham all-weather road, which will connect various Hindu pilgrimage sites. Some experts say the project, a flagship initiative of the federal government, will worsen the fragile situation in the upper Himalayas, where several cities are built on the rubble of landslides.
A large number of pilgrims and tourists visit the many Hindu temples in Uttarakhand, with the number increasing throughout the year due to the ongoing construction of buildings and roads.
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
