INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
DEHRADUN/SILKYARA: After swinging between hope and despair for over 11 days, the 41 workers trapped inside the Silkyara tunnel were close to
being rescued late on Wednesday after the multi-agency rescue operation, which had been focusing on the strategy of horizontal drilling
since past two days, succeeded in breaching a significant portion of the debris that was blocking the way inside.The US-made auger drilling
machine, which had broken down on November 16, leading to temporary suspension of the horizontal drilling option, was put to work again on
Its job was to push 900mm pipes inside the debris till a distance of around 60 metres so that the workers could crawl inside the pipes and
At the time of filing this report late on Wednesday, rescuers had breached around 45 metres of the debris, with only a 15-metre distance
left for them to drill.A source involved in the rescue operation told TOI that the auger machine had hit an obstacle in the evening around
6pm, leading to a temporary halt in the drilling
After a manual inspection, they found a metal object in the way
They have been involved in negotiating the obstacle using a gas cutter
Once that is done, the machine will start drilling again to push pipes into the leftover part," a member of the rescue team said.To give
emergency safe passage to the rescue teams operating inside the tunnel, an escape passage by way of placing box culverts and hume pipes for
a length of 67 metres had also been completed, an official of the National Highways - Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited
(NHIDCL), the agency executing the tunnel project, said.Meanwhile, Bhaksar Khulbe, former secretary to the Prime Minister and currently
Silkyara tunnel done upto depth of 25 metre, efforts underway to rescue 40 trapped labourers
