Indian workers trapped in collapsed tunnel rescued after 17 days

Cheers and jubilation erupted as rescuers in India on Tuesday brought out 41 construction workers who were trapped in a collapsed tunnel in the Himalayas for 17 days, hours after drilling through the debris of rock, concrete and earth to reach them.

"I am completely relieved and happy as 41 trapped laborers in the Silkyara Tunnel Collapse have been successfully rescued," Minister of Road Transport Nitin Gadkari said in a statement. "This was a well-coordinated effort by multiple agencies, marking one of the most significant rescue operations in recent years."

© Uttarkashi District Information via Reuters

The rescued men were draped in orange marigold flower garlands in celebration as they were greeted by state officials as a line of ambulances waited to receive them.

The men, low-wage workers from India's poorest states, were stuck in the 4.5 kilometre (3 mile) tunnel in Uttarakhand state since it collapsed on November 12.

Choudhary shows a picture of his son Manjeet Kumar trapped in the under-construction Silkyara road tunnel, days after it collapsed in the Uttarkashi district of India's Uttarakhand state, on November 21, 2023. © Arun Sankar / AFPLocals worship the deity "Boukhnag", days after the under-construction tunnel collapsed, on November 23, 2023. © Arun Sankar / AFP

The workers were seen alive for the first time exactly a week ago, peering into the lens of an endoscopic camera sent by rescuers down a thin pipe through which air, food, water, oxygen, medicine and electricity have been delivered.

Though trapped, they had plenty of space in the tunnel, with the area inside 8.5 metres high and stretching about 2 kilometres in length.

A trapped worker is seen in this picture taken with an endoscopic camera and released by the Information and Public Relation Department (DIPR) in Uttarakhand on November 21, 2023. AFPA man prepares food for workers trapped in the collapsed tunnel on November 24, 2023. © Arun Sankar / AFP

Efforts to dig a tunnel to reach and rescue the workers with drilling machines were complicated by falling debris and repeated breakdowns of drilling machines.

The government said on Wednesday efforts had been thwarted by the "challenging Himalayan terrain".

Last week, engineers working to drive a metal pipe horizontally through 57 meters (187 feet) of rock and concrete ran into metal girders and construction vehicles buried in the earth, snapping a giant earth-boring auger machine.

In a separate effort, vertical drilling reached more than a quarter of the 89 meters down to the men, a risky route in an area that has already suffered a collapse. A drilling machine was brought up to the forested hill above the tunnel on a specially constructed track.

India's Minister for Road Transport and Highways Vijay Kumar Singh (R) inspects an earth-boring machine deployed to drill a vertical hole into the collapsed tunnel on November 26, 2023. © Arun Sankar / AFPA rescuer welds a driller head during rescue operations for the trapped workers on November 21, 2023. © Arun Sankar / AFP

So-called rat miners were brought in on Monday to drill through the rocks, gravel and metal obstacles by hand from inside a narrow evacuation pipe that pushed through the debris after machinery failed.

A general view shows the entrance of the under-construction Silkyara road tunnel, days after a section of it collapsed, on November 22, 2023. © Arun Sankar / AFP

The tunnel is part of the $1.5 billion Char Dham highway, one of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's most ambitious projects, aimed at connecting four Hindu pilgrimage sites through an 890-kilometer network of roads.

Authorities have not said what caused the cave-in but the region is prone to landslides, earthquakes and floods.

(FRANCE 24 with REUTERS and AFP)