Uttarakhand tunnel collapse: Rescuers manually dig to rescue trapped workers

Rescue work to save 41 workers trapped in a tunnel in the Indian state of Uttarakhand was delayed for at least four to five days due to the malfunction of the drilling machine inside the tunnel.

Rescuers will start digging manually once the defective part is removed.

The workers remained stuck inside the tunnel for two weeks after part of it collapsed due to a landslide.

The process was difficult due to the presence of rocks, stones and metals inside the rubble.

Rescuers are having to resort to manual digging because the auger keeps getting stuck in pieces of metal mixed in with the debris, and they say it would be better to switch to manual digging rather than wait for a replacement machine.

“The machine has broken down. It can’t be repaired. It’s broken down,” Arnold Dix, a tunneling expert assisting in the rescue work, told reporters at the site.

But Dix said he was confident the 41 men would return home, saying there were “many ways” to reach them.

Part of the 4.5 km (3 miles) Silkyara Tunnel in the Indian Himalayas collapsed on November 12.

The trapped men were contacted shortly afterwards, and have been receiving oxygen, food and water ever since.

Rescuers were only 9 meters (30 ft) from breaching the workers before the auger broke.

The damaged drilling machine will be taken out by Sunday morning, allowing rescuers to continue digging manually, Pushkar Singh Dhami, chief minister of Uttarakhand state, told reporters on Saturday.

Dami told reporters that he spoke to the trapped men, saying: “They are in good spirits. They said: ‘Take as many days as you need, don’t worry about us.’”

Meanwhile, ambulances remained on standby outside the tunnel. Officials say the goal is to get the workers to a safe place and get them to a nearby hospital as quickly as possible.

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