After weeks of excavation, rescuers remove 1,500 tonnes of debris, bringing hope for locating the seven missing workers.
Hyderabad: Rescuers in the SLBC tunnel on Tuesday achieved an important breakthrough with officials saying that for the first time since efforts to find the workers missing since the February 22 collapse began, all three levels of the tunnel boring machine were exposed after removal of more than 1,500 tonnes of silt and broken machine parts.
According to Arvind Kumar, special chief secretary, of disaster management, Tuesday’s development means rescuers can now focus on searching for the missing seven workers.
Teams from Singareni Collieries and SDRF, along with others have been given different tasks in the rescue work area and this has helped in faster removal of the different kinds of debris. “We are hopeful that we can make a breakthrough in finding the missing workers in the next day or two,” Arvind Kumar said.
It may be recalled that eight workers had gone missing after the February 22 accident and the body of one of them was found on March 9.
Arvind Kumar said water jets were being used to wash the silt from the machine and excavators were being used to load silt onto the conveyor belt.
A lot of electric cables from the machine that were destroyed in the accident are also being cut along with machine parts and are being taken out on the locomotive, he said.
