Srinagar: A portion of a mountain fell apart in the Makerkote area on Jammu–Srinagar National Highway in J&K’s Ramban district on Friday, near the site of a rescue operation where a part of an under-construction tunnel collapsed late last night, reported news agency ANI. The fresh landslide forced the search and rescue operations to be put on hold.
Talking to ANI, Deputy Commissioner of Ramban Massaratul Islam called it a major setback and said, “We were not expecting something like this. Two machines got stuck. Due to wind storms, rescue operation was impacted. 16-17 hours of operation was wasted. Have to make a new assessment”.
#WATCH | A portion of a mountain falls apart in the Makerkote area at Jammu–Srinagar National Highway in Ramban near the site of the recuse operation, where a part of an under-construction tunnel collapsed late last night pic.twitter.com/SAjDhwFgol
— ANI (@ANI) May 20, 2022
A labourer was killed and three rescued after a part of an under-construction tunnel collapsed on the Jammu-Srinagar national highway in the union territory’s Ramban district on Thursday. Nine workers continue to be trapped in the debris as rescue operations continue. However, their chances of survival are slim, the officials said.
“Around 10.15 pm on Thursday, the audit tunnel of T3 on the highway near Khooni Nallah in Ramban collapsed, trapping 11-12 labourers of Sarla Company working there,” a senior official told PTI. The rescue operation on the national highway stretch between Ramban and Ramsu started at midnight and was going on in full swing with rock-breakers being used to reach out to those trapped, he said.
Names of those trapped inside tunnel
Those trapped inside the tunnel are – Jadav Roy (23), Gautam Roy (22), Sudhir Roy (31), Dipak Roy (33) and Parimal Roy (38), all from West Bengal, Shiva Chouhan (26) from Assam, Nepali citizens Nawaraj Chowdhury (26) and Kushi Ram (25), and Jammu and Kashmir residents Muzaffar (38) and Israt (30), officials said.
Two of those hospitalised are identified as Vishnu Gola (33) of Jharkhand and Ameen (26) of Jammu and Kashmir. The third person, whose name has not been disclosed, has been taken to the Government Medical College Hospital in Jammu, police said. All of them were employed by a company tasked with auditing the tunnel, they said.
(With inputs from agency)
