Heavy rains threaten to delay the search for two people who remain missing in a flooded cave in Laos, after five others were rescued after being trapped underground for more than a week.
Finnish diver Mikko Paasi, one of the first international rescuers to arrive at the site, told The Associated Press that rains on Sunday had filled the cave up to the second chamber, preventing divers from entering until pumps can lower the water level.
A drainage pump also broke, making the situation even more difficult, said fellow diver Yoshitaka Isaji of Japan. Rescue teams from Laos and neighboring Thailand have been working together over the past week, alongside divers from Finland, Malaysia, Japan, Indonesia, France and Australia.
Seven people entered the cave in a remote mountainous area of central Xaysomboun province last week to look for valuable minerals such as gold, before being trapped by a flash flood that blocked their way out, according to local media reports. One other person escaped and alerted the authorities.
A Laotian rescue group said on Sunday it had received “substantial” information on the cave system from the five men who were rescued earlier this week. “The hope is that today’s mission will locate both remaining victims,” the group wrote on social media.
The rescued men were being treated at a local hospital and were doing well, Malaysian diver Lee Kian Lie, who is taking part in the operation, told AP. “We interviewed them about how the deeper part of the cave looks like. We will continue to search based on the information we have, and perhaps we will be able to get to the other two,” he said.
Rescuers said they navigated more than 200 meters (650 feet) into the cave and discovered five chambers in the system. The five people rescued so far were found in the fifth chamber. Paasi told AP that the survivors reported a narrow crack in the fifth chamber that could be a passage leading to a deeper part of the cave system.
The five men who were rescued – identified by their first names as Khamla, Mued, Ee, Ing and Laen – were first found last Wednesday. The first man was safely extracted on Friday, guided through a narrow flooded passage by an expert diver. The remaining four left the cave on Saturday, after the water receded enough for them to walk out on their own.
Videos posted online on Saturday showed emotional moments as the men emerged one by one from the cave. Some collapsed on the ground at the cave’s entrance, and were hugged by a group of workers who cried with joy. Later moments showed them lying on stretchers, wrapped in foil blankets and fitted with oxygen masks before being transported out.
Source: www.aljazeera.com