rescuers are only five meters away from the 41 trapped workers

Indian rescue teams came within five meters of the 41 workers trapped since November 12 in a road tunnel that partially collapsed at Silkyara, in northern India. They now hope to reach them “Soon”, announced the chief minister of the state of Uttarakhand, Tuesday, November 28. A steel pipe wide enough to allow the passage of men “was introduced up to 52 meters inside the tunnel, and it is expected to break through [les décombres] at 57 meters”Pushkar Singh Dhami told reporters.

After repeated setbacks, military engineers and miners are working manually to break through rock and rubble to free the final stretch and reach the men who have been imprisoned for 17 days. A team of three people take turns digging and inserting the last parts of the steel tube just wide enough to allow one man to pass through, and allow the workers to evacuate.

A duct carries air and food

When one digs, a second removes the debris by hand and the third places it in a cart which then reaches the exit, explained Rajput Rai, a drilling expert, quoted by the Press Trust of India agency. The men also have to cut through a tangle of metal rods that obstruct their progress. Since the tunnel collapsed on November 12, rescue efforts have been complicated and slowed by falling debris and successive failures of drills, crucial machines for rescuing workers.

The men have survived for more than two weeks thanks to the delivery of air, food, water and electricity through a conduit through which an endoscopic camera was inserted. This camera allowed their families to see them last week, for the first time since the tunnel collapsed.