SILKYARA, India - Rescuers on Nov 27 brought in “rat miners” to drill through a narrow pipe and help pull out 41 construction workers trapped in a tunnel in the Indian Himalayas for more than two weeks, officials said.

The trapped men, low-wage workers from India’s poorest states, have been stuck in the 4.5km tunnel in Uttarakhand state since it collapsed on Nov 12.

They have been getting food, water, light, oxygen and medicines through a pipe, but efforts to dig a tunnel using high-powered machines have run into snags.

Attempts to drill a tunnel horizontally through the debris trapping them have been plagued by damage to machinery, and rescuers will now resort to drilling by hand, after clearing away the broken equipment inside the narrow evacuation pipe.

The drilling from inside the pipe, which is 900mm wide, will be done by a team of six “rat miners” from central India, described by officials as “skilled workers”.

“Rat mining” is a primitive, hazardous and controversial method used in India mostly to remove coal deposits through narrow passages. The name comes from its resemblance to rats burrowing through narrow holes.

“Three of us will go inside the tunnel; one will do the drilling, another will collect muck and the third one will push the muck through the trolley,” Mr Rakesh Rajput, one of the miners, told Reuters.

“We have been doing it for more than 10 years and there’s enough space for us. The 41 men are also labourers and we all want to bring them out,” he said.

‘Sure-shot way’

Government and private agencies involved in the rescue have been pursuing other options.

On Nov 26, they opened another route to the men, aiming to drill a shaft straight down from the top of the mountain above.

By Nov 27 afternoon, they had drilled 31m of the 86m, officials said, adding that the focus remains on the horizontal route.

“Skilled labourers will do the manual drilling,” said Mr Harpal Singh, a former head of state-run Border Roads Organisation. “This is a sure-shot way of making progress.”

Bad weather could complicate the rescue. Thunderstorms, hail and lower temperatures with a minimum of 9 deg C are forecast in the mountains.

“They are trained in working in every situation so that’s not a worry for us,” said Mr Mahmood Ahmad, managing director of the NHIDCL company, which is building the tunnel.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s principal secretary, or chief of staff, Mr P.K. Mishra, visited the site and spoke to the trapped men through a communication link. He told them “everyone is making efforts to bring all of you out as early as possible”.

The tunnel is part of the Char Dham Highway, one of Mr Modi’s most ambitious projects, aimed at connecting four Hindu pilgrimage sites through 890km of roads.

The authorities have not said what caused the cave-in which trapped the men as they were nearing the end of their night shift but the region is prone to landslides, earthquakes and floods. REUTERS