Four days after a catastrophic flood hit a valley in the Indian Himalayas, hopes began to wane to find more survivors in the muddy wreckage of two dams destroyed in the disaster.
So far, 34 bodies of the disaster have been recovered and more than 170 are still missing. At least two bodies were discovered in the city of Rishikesh, which is about 150 kilometers downstream.
Rescue efforts are still focused on a tunnel under the Tapovan-Vishnugad hydroelectric dam on the Dhauliganga River, in the state of Uttarakhand, where about 30 men were working when the violent surge of water engulfed the plant on Sunday morning.
The flash flood is thought to be caused by an avalanche or landslide that hit a hanging glacier, leading to a large and destructive stream of water flowing into the Chamoli River Valley, destroying two hydroelectric dams and several bridges along the way.
There was anger and protests among families over the missing that all rescue efforts were focused on the Tapovan tunnel. Relatives of 57 men still missing in the Rishiganga hydroelectric dam project, which was the first to be hit by the fast-flowing watercourse and completely wiped out, said authorities made no effort to excavate them.
Shoaib Malik, 24, whose father worked at the Rishiganga plant but was not at work on the day of the disaster, was on the scene helping relatives whose 57 loved ones were deep in a smaller tunnel and was buried in the wreckage of the power station.
Many of the workers were from other states, including Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, and Kashmir, and some of the families traveled hundreds of miles when they heard of the floods.
“The situation for these families is worse than I can put it,” Malik said. ‘They’ve given up hope of finding someone alive, so if they get the corpses, that’s enough. But even that seems impossible at the moment, because the rescue team is only focusing on rebuilding the road, they are not trying to help dig them. ‘
After more than 100 family members protested on Wednesday morning, the army gave them two excavators to dig in the tunnel, but the families had to use it themselves due to limited rescue personnel.
“The forces here are not helping us, so we are doing it ourselves,” Malik said. ‘The company that runs this plant is sending more machinery from Delhi, but we can not wait until then. We try to pick out this place and find our own people so we can at least give them their last rituals. ”
No signs of life have been heard from the 1.5-kilometer-long Tapovan tunnel since the disaster. Dozens of relatives of those trapped there anxiously gathered at the site and prayed.
Among them was 58-year-old Pal Chand, whose son Vineet Saini was an engineer for the hydroelectric dam. “My heart sank with each passing minute, but I am hopeful that I will reunite with my son and that he will appear safe and healthy,” he told the Times of India.
More than 600 paramilitary, police and rescue personnel have been working since Sunday to remove mud, debris and rocks from the tunnel entrance using a combination of heavy machinery and manual labor.
Drones with heat sensor cameras and sniffer dogs were also brought in and nearly 100 meters of the tunnel were cleared, but hopes of the withdrawal of one of the workers who were alive diminished when the fourth day of the rescue at night fell. Ashok Kumar, the state’s director general of police, acknowledged there was “not much progress with the rescue operation.”
Uttarakhand chief minister Trivendra Singh Rawat said rescue workers were trying to gain access to the tunnel by taking alternative routes after failing to remove mud from the entrance. He said: “They plan to drill the tunnel and enter using ropes because they are struggling to clean the sludge even after using heavy machinery.”
Pope Francis said on Wednesday he “prays for the missing workers, for their families and for all the injured and those who have suffered losses”.
The Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, wrote to the Prime Minister of Uttarakhand to express his sadness over the incident. “I express my condolences to those who have lost loved ones and pray for them. I also pray for the safety and well-being of those who are still missing, “reads the letter.