Uttarkashi: Location for vertical drilling project identified to evacuate 41 trapped labourers

A location has been chosen for vertical drilling in an attempt to rescue the 41 workers who are stuck inside the Silkyara Tunnel, 11 days after the collapsed.

As per the Director of National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation (NHIDCL), Anshu Manish Khulko, “The location for vertical drilling has been identified. Road work for vertical drilling on the hill above the tunnel is almost complete. More than 350 meters of road construction work is complete. BRO is building a road from both Silkyara and Barkot sides which is almost complete.”

Meanwhile, a piling machine that became stuck on the narrow road yesterday has now made it to the Silkyara tunnel location. On Tuesday, rescuers made an attempt at “horizontal drilling” and concurrently provided solid, cooked food to the workers who were trapped.

A total of five agencies– ONGC, SJVNL, RVNL, NHIDCL, and THDCL– have been assigned specific responsibilities to evacuate the 41 labourers trapped for 10 days in the 2-km-built portion of the under-construction structure following a landslide.
Despite the rescuers achieving a breakthrough on Monday evening by laying a 6-inch-wide pipe, the trapped men were only provided fruits such as bananas, oranges, and medicines today as Khichdi in cylindrical plastic bottles could not pass through the 53-metre-long alternative lifeline.

Tuesday night, food was provided to laborers stranded in the Silkyara tunnel via a food pipe that was inserted through the collapsed portion of the building. The meal consisted of vegetable pulao, matar-paneer, and chapatis with butter. On November 12, while a tunnel was being built from Silkyara to Barkot, it collapsed, trapping 41 workers because of a muck fall that happened in a 60-meter section on the Silkyara side of the tunnel.