Helicopter evacuation has begun in Chamoli district, in the northern Indian state of Uttarakhand, after a Border Roads Organisation (BRO) camp was buried in an avalanche on Friday, trapping 55 people under deep snow.
At last count, at least 33 people had been rescued, and efforts were on to bring out 22 more. Reports this morning said that 14 more people were rescued, taking the total rescue figure to 47.
An X post by @DDNewslive at 9.43am on March 1 said: “14 civilians have been rescued and evacuated from avalanche site by Indian Army this morning. Search and rescue operations continuing for more than 24 hours. With slight respite in the weather, three injured personnel evacuated from Mana to Joshimath for critical medicare through Indian Army-hired civil helicopters.”
Rescuers had resumed the search for labourers trapped under several feet of snow in the high-altitude Mana village, in Chamoli district, on Saturday morning as the weather cleared up. Before this, rain and snowfall had hampered the rescue efforts and the operation had been suspended as night fell.
The snowslide, which buried the BRO camp between Mana and Badrinath, rolled down early on Friday morning. Private and Indian Air Force (IAF) helicopters will aid the rescue efforts on Saturday if the weather permits.
Located 3km from Badrinath, Mana is the last village on the India-Tibet border at a height of 3,200 metres. Visuals from Mana showed rescuers trudging through high piles of snow in an eerie landscape bathed in white.
The nearest airstrip at Gauchar was readied for the purpose of helicopter rescue, said Chamoli District Disaster Management Officer NK Joshi. Indian Army and Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) personnel based in Mana had resumed the rescue operation, he added.
Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami is also likely to visit the avalanche site.
A let-up in rain and snowfall can help speed up efforts to trace the remaining labourers who have been trapped under the snow for more than 24 hours now.
According to a list released by the Uttarakhand State Disaster Management Authority, the trapped labourers are from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, and Jammu and Kashmir, among other states. The list has 10 labourers’ names, without mentioning the states they belong to.
Disaster Management Secretary Vinod Kumar Suman said on Friday that the task was challenging as there was 7 feet of snow near the avalanche site. More than 65 personnel were engaged in the rescue operations, he said.
Border Roards Organisation (BRO) is a statutory body under the Indian Ministry of Road Transport and Highways. BRO is in charge of building and maintaining road infrastructure in some of the most challenging terrains around the country.
Indian Army’s Ibex Brigade to the rescue
The BRO camp rescue operations were stopped in view of the bad weather and the impending danger of more avalanches in Mana. Two smaller avalanches had followed the main one.
The Friday avalanche hit between 5.30am and 6am, burying the BRO workers inside eight containers and a shed, the Indian Army said. The containers got buried under 6-7 feet deep snow.
The Indian Army’s swift response teams, comprising more than 100 personnel from the Ibex Brigade, specially trained for high-altitude rescue operations, were immediately mobilised. The teams included doctors and ambulances.
Teams of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) also left for the avalanche spot, about 300km from Uttarakhand state capital of Dehradun, amid snowfall and rain on Friday.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah said that rescuing the trapped people was the government’s priority. In a post on X, Amit Shah said that he had talked to Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami and the directors general of the ITBP and NDRF.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said that all efforts were being made to rescue the trapped workers by utilising every available resource. In an X post on Friday, he wrote: “An unfortunate avalanche has occurred in the Mana area of Joshimath (Uttarakhand) today impacting a GREF camp of BRO. Spoke to CM Shri @pushkardhami regarding the situation. The administration is providing all assistance to the affected.”
The NDRF said it had rushed four teams to Chamoli. Besides, another four units were on standby, NDRF Director General (DG) Piyush Anand told PTI.
Officials said that two teams were rushed from the Regional Response Centre (RRC) of the NDRF in Dehradun, while the other two were diverted from Joshimath, about 50km from Mana, where they were undertaking a familiarisation exercise.
