No one found inside Rasuwagadhi hydropower tunnel; 93 remain untraced

A rescue team has found no one inside the tunnel of the flood-hit Rasuwagadhi Hydropower Project in Nepal’s Rasuwa district, leaving the whereabouts of 93 people associated with the facility uncertain.

The Nepali Army-led team searched the entire tunnel of the 111 MW project after fears emerged that workers might have become trapped inside when the Bhote Koshi River flooded last week.

“The rescue team led by the Nepali Army has returned after searching the tunnel of the 111-MW flood-affected project in Rasuwa and finding no people inside,” the Prime Minister’s Secretariat said on Monday.

Army personnel were accompanied by engineers and a drone unit during the operation. The team reached the innermost part of the tunnel, including its endpoint, and used drones to inspect the area.

“However, no signs of human presence were found during the operation,” the Prime Minister’s Secretariat said.

After establishing that nobody was inside, the team concluded the tunnel search and returned to Dhunche in Rasuwa. The fate of the 93 people who had been working at the project remains unclear.

Search and rescue operations are continuing across 11 hydropower projects affected by flooding in Rasuwa and Nuwakot districts. The facilities are situated along the Bhote Koshi and Trishuli river corridors.

The Independent Power Producers’ Association, Nepal, said 897 people employed across the 11 projects remained out of contact. The figure includes workers from the Rasuwagadhi project.

Indian and Chinese tunnel specialists have joined the operations at the request of the Nepal government, working alongside domestic rescue agencies to locate and evacuate people feared trapped at hydropower sites.

According to Nepal’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority, seven Indian and 15 Chinese nationals stranded at hydropower projects were rescued on Sunday.

The Indian Embassy said a specialist team from India was continuing searches at tunnel sites affected by the devastating flooding.

“The tunnel rescue team from India worked with the Nepali Army's team to conduct search and rescue operations at hydropower tunnel sites in the Chilime and Langtang areas today,” the embassy said on Monday.

The Indian personnel will continue working in coordination with the Nepali Army as efforts to trace missing hydropower workers proceed across the affected region, it added.

With IANS inputs