Hyderabad: eight people were trapped inside when a part of the tunnel roof in SHISAILAM LEFT Channel of the shore (SLBC) collapsed on Saturday morning near Domalpenta in the district of Nagarku in Telangana.
The sources said 60 workers were in the place when the roof suddenly collapsed for about 200 meters inside the tunnel, which has a depth of 500 feet. While 52 of them managed to leave safely, and some of them taken to the hospital with injuries, eight workers were trapped at the bottom of the tunnel.
These included Jaiprakash Associates LIMITED PROJECT ENGINEER MANJ KUMAR AND FIELD ENGINEER SRI NIWAS, both of Uttar Pradesh, four workers of Jharkhand – Sandeep Sahu, Jataks, Santosh Sahu and Anuj Sahu, and two Máineos de Robbins India Company – Sunny Singh Singh of J & K and Gurpreet Punjab Punjabab Singh.
According to the sources, communication with the people trapped had not been established until the reports arrived for the last time. Rock displacement noises were heard until night, indicating that the roof in collapsed areas was still unstable, the sources said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi marked the principal minister as Revanth Reddy to ask about the accident and assured all the possible assistance of the center, including the deployment of the National Disaster Response Force personnel (NDRF), for the rescue operation in progress .
According to high irrigation officials, the tunnel roof collapsed due to a sudden leak of water and land, covering almost 13 km from the excavation site. The SLBC tunnel is approximately 44 km long from the left bank of the Srisailam dam.
The accident occurred about 13 km from the tunnel’s mouth. A fracture of land on the side of the tunnel wall caused the water and mud to sprout, forced workers to fight safety.
Jaiprakash Associates and Robbins India, responsible for the boring tunnel, said that the accident took place within 30 minutes after the work at 8 am those positioned near the boring machine of the tunnel managed to escape, while workers in the Front section of the tunnel were trapped, they said representatives of the companies. The works stopped immediately and the supervisors quickly evacuated as many workers as possible.
The authorities said that the ventilation system within the tunnel remained functional, ensuring the supply of oxygen to trapped workers. Army teams are expected to arrive at the site on Saturday night.