Rescuers try to drill into tunnel to save trapped 34

On the seventh day of the rescue operation at the

NTPC

tunnel in

Tapovan

on Saturday, rescue personnel continued with the strategy of trying to access 34 persons by drilling their way to an underground silt flushing tunnel that runs parallel to the main one and is believed to be the passage that could lead to the men, report Gaurav Talwar & Abhijeet Singh After getting success in drilling a 75mm diameter hole on Friday, drilling of a 300 mm bore hole was continuing, as per rescue officials.

Rescue teams led by NDRF and

SDRF

also continued removing the slush from the tunnel and till the time of filing of this report had managed to clear the way up to 136

mtr

inside the main head race tunnel and were aiming to reach the 180 mtr point — where the stranded persons are suspected to be — in the next 10-12 hours.

“A special operation was carried out to divert water and slush flow from left bank to right bank of Dhauliganga on Saturday,” said

Vivek Pandey

, spokesperson, ITBP. On Saturday, no bodies were recovered.