LAOS DAM FAULT FOUND DAY EARLIER
THE South Korean partner in a Laos hydropower dam said yesterday it discovered the upper part of the structure had washed away 24 hours before it collapsed, engulfing villages and leaving hundreds missing.
The wall of water unleashed on Monday by the failure of the dam in the country’s southeast surged downstream, sweeping away homes and leaving an unknown number of people feared dead.
SK Engineering & Construction, a South Korean builder that is one of the partners in the project, said it discovered the damage to an auxiliary dam at around 9pm Sunday local time.
“We immediately alerted the authorities and began evacuating (nearby) villagers downstream,” it said in a statement. The government was warned about further damage.