Amid operations to rescue 40 workers trapped in Uttarakhand at the Silkyara tunnel collapse site, officials announced on Friday that a C-17 transport aircraft of the Indian Air Force has been deployed to airlift almost 22 tonnes of critical equipment from Indore to Dehradun, officials said on Friday.
Rescuers at the site of the incident are now anticipating the arrival of a second digging machine on Saturday to resume operations.
On Friday, work came to a halt when rescue workers attempting to restart the drilling machine heard a “large-scale cracking sound,” as reported by the state-run National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation.
Another high-performance drilling machine airlifted from Indore in Madhya Pradesh has already landed at the Jolly Grant airport in Dehradun and is being transported by road to Silkyara where it will be unloaded and assembled before being deployed for drilling, officials on the spot said.
The IAF has continued with its operations to assist the ongoing tunnel rescue underway at Dharasu, Uttarakhand.
"An IAF C-17 has been deployed to airlift almost 22 Tonnes of critical equipment from Indore to Dehradu," IAF confirmed through a post on 'X'.
Around 2.45 pm on Friday, during the positioning of the fifth pipe, a loud cracking sound was heard in the tunnel after which the rescue operation was suspended, a statement issued by the NHIDCL late on Friday night said.
By the time the operation was halted on Friday afternoon, the heavy-duty auger machine had drilled up to 24 metres through the rubble spread over a 60-metre area inside the tunnel.
The sound created panic among the rescue team. An expert involved with the project warned about the possibility of further collapse in the vicinity. Subsequently, the pipe-pushing activity was stopped.
While officials say the men are safe – communication has been established via walkie-talkies and they are being supplied food and oxygen via a pipe meant to supply water.
People trapped inside the tunnel are labourers hailing from Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Odisha, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh, as per the District Emergency Operation Centre.
It was around 5.30 am on Sunday that the under-construction tunnel on the Yamunotri National Highway, meant to connect Silkyara and Dandalgaon in Uttarakhand’s Uttarkashi district, collapsed. A nearly 30-metre stretch of the tunnel, being built by the National Highways & Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited (NHIDCL), has been affected by the cave-in.
The construction of the tunnel, which is part of the Char Dham road project, will reduce the journey from Uttarkashi to Yamunotri by 26 km.
(With inputs from ENS, PTI and IE)