Indian officials warned that the chances of survival for eight people believed to have been trapped in a tunnel collapsing for several days are remote, after a hurry of mud and water caused by the ceiling over the weekend.
The team worked for the Srisalam tunnel project abandoned the channel tunnel in the South Indian Telangana state, a ten -year attempt to build one of the longest irrigation tunnels in the world, which are plagued by a series of delays since the 2005 construction began .
The workers were about nine miles in the tunnel on Saturday morning, when the roof collapsed after a hurry of mud and water, according to local officials and news reports. Some escaped, but eight were trapped behind a machine that hit the tunnel blocking their exit.
“The water fell in and the roof fell in,” Manoj Gaur, president of the Jaiprakash Associates of the Indian construction company that co-operates the project, said in an interview. “The tunnel is a large tunnel with a diameter of over 10 meters. Imagine that most of this height is filled with water, stone and mud.”
Rescuers were unable to contact workers from the accident and their conditions were unclear on Monday. Nine agencies, including the Indian Army and the maritime governors, are working together for rescue efforts.
Among them are members of a group that led to a rescue attempt in 2023 to save 41 workers after being trapped for 17 days in a collapsing tunnel in Uttarakhand, a northern Indian state. Activists and environmentalists had long warned that the distorted road of many billions of dollars would destabilize the mountainous territory and said it eventually caused a landslide that led to the disaster.
Julyly Krishna Rao, a state minister of Telangana, who helped oversee rescue efforts, said the chances have declined that the victims of the collapse of the tunnel of this weekend would find themselves alive.
“I can’t predict the chances of survival, but the chances are not very good,” Mr Krishna Rao told Indian News Elthets. “But even if there is the slightest chance, we will try to save them.”
Until Monday morning, rescuers reported that they arrived at the boring tunnel machine that prevents the area. But their efforts were hindered by the serious debris and the accumulation of Silt, which in the Some parts are alleged to have been six to seven feet high.
Pragati Krishnapuradoddi Byregowda contributed to the report from New Delhi.
