Sifting for life in dead-end tunnel

Overnight, after trudging through slush and drilling through a tunnel chockfull of debris, at Tapovan in Chamoli, the ITBP personnel were able to rescue 39 labourers.

The tunnel, which turned into a death trap for the workers of an NTPC thermal power plant, is over 2.5 km long with just one entry point; somewhere along the middle it bifurcates into two.

It was hard to tell where the remaining workers were trapped or whether they were all sitting together in a huddle. No cries were emanating from behind the boulders and only sniffer dogs were likely to ferret them out.

More than 200 ITBP personnel were on the spot. An Engineering Task Force of the Army had prised open the mouth of the tunnel. NDRF personnel assisted in the rescue work by clearing the debris with the help of excavators and shovels. Rescuers were seen in images and videos carrying wooden planks, to create makeshif t platforms to extricate the trapped.

Teams were on standby with dragon light sets, oxygen cylinders and stretchers to provide immediate help to the survivors. In all, 18 bodies have been recovered thus far but 202 are still unaccounted for. The entire landscape -- a sandy grey – seemed to encapsulate the mood in the relief camp.

A hanging glacier may have broken away from the main glacier which caused the devastating deluge. Defence Research and Development Organisation scientists are on the spot analysing data to ascertain the cause of the glacier burst.

"Our team conducted an aerial survey of the glacier where the incident took place in Chamoli. Prima facie, it seems that a hanging glacier broke away from the main glacier and came crashing down in the narrow valley," a DRDO scientist told ANI.

In the valley, it formed a lake which burst and caused the deluge.