4 more boys brought out of Thailand cave
HUGE RELIEF Four boys and their coach still inside Tham Luang cave complex MAE SAI:
Four more of the boys trapped for over two weeks in a flooded cave in northern Thailand were brought out on Monday, an official said, bringing to eight the number extracted in a high-stakes rescue operation.
“The eighth person is out and the operation is done for today,” Sitthichai Klangpattana, flag officer to Thailand’s navy SEAL commander, told The Associated Press. “Four boys were brought out today.”
He didn’t comment on the health of the boys or how well the operation had gone.
On Sunday, when the highrisk rescue operation to rescue the 12 boys and their coach began, teams of divers brought out four of the boys but waited several hours before confirming their safe rescue.
After Monday’s rescue effort, four boys and the coach were still inside the cave.
Chiang Rai acting Gov. Narongsak Osatanakorn said earlier Monday that the second phase began at 11 a.m. and authorities “hope to hear good news in the next few hours.”
“All conditions are still as good as they were yesterday,” Narongsak told a news conference. “The boys’ strength, the plan - today we are ready like before. And we will do it faster because we are afraid of the rain.”
Authoritieshavebeenrushing to extract the boys, ages 11-16, and their coach from the cave as the annual monsoon bears down on the mountainous region in far northern Chiang Rai province. Workers have been laboring around the clock to pump water out of the cave, and authorities said Monday that heavy downpours overnight did not raise water levels inside.
The four boys pulled from the cave Sunday in an urgent and dangerous operation that involved them diving through the cave’s dark, tight and twisting passages were happy and in good health, authorities said.
“This morning they said they were hungry and wanted to eat khao pad grapao,” Narongsak said, referring to a Thai dish of meat fried with chili and basil and served over rice.
Still, the four were undergoing medical checks in a hospital in the provincial capital and were not yet allowed close contact with relatives due to fear of infections. Relatives were able to see them through a glass partition, the governor said.
The boys and their coach went exploring in the massive Tham Luang Nang Non cave on June 23 after a soccer practice, and were cut off when a rainstorm flooded the cave. A massive international search operation was launched and it took 10 days to locate the boys, who had taken shelter on a dry slope deep in the complex.
The search and rescue operation has riveted people both in Thailand and internationally, with journalists from across the globe traveling to this town along the border with Myanmar to report on the ordeal.