Dozens found alive in metal containers after India avalanche
Dozens of construction workers have been pulled alive from metal containers after being trapped for nearly two days by a deadly avalanche in the Himalayas.
Rescue teams from the Indian Army and Indo-Tibetan Border Police dug out 46 people in an operation that lasted 60 hours in freezing temperatures. A further eight people were killed in the disaster.
The avalanche struck the village of Mana, Uttarakhand, in India last Friday following heavy snowfall near a construction site some 10,000 feet above sea level.
Many of those rescued were migrant labourers working on a highway project in the remote region 26 km away from the Line of Actual Control, a de facto border between India and China, according to local officials.
Lt Col Manish Srivastava, an Indian defence spokesperson in Uttarakhand, said the workers had been sheltering inside eight metal containers instead of their usual tents because of the harsh weather – a decision that likely saved many lives.
A senior Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) official told The Telegraph: “The containers provided crucial protection, and in fact, made the rescue operation easier.”
He continued: “Finding people buried under dense snow is extremely challenging, but these containers helped keep them safe and visible to rescue teams. They had just enough oxygen to hold on until we got them out.”
Jagbir Singh, one of the survivors from the city of Amritsar, said, “I was sleeping in the container when suddenly, it started rolling down with the snow. By the time I realised what had happened, I found myself trapped – one of my legs was fractured, I had a head injury, and a colleague lying next to me was dead.”
The avalanche was so powerful that it hurled the containers 300 meters downhill in just 10 seconds towards the Alaknanda river, he said.
“A smaller snow slide had occurred earlier, but the main avalanche struck at around 5:30am, giving us no time to react,” Mr Singh said.
“We lay there for nearly 12 hours before the Army and ITBP teams started rescuing us. If they had not arrived in time, we would not have made it,” he added.
Images shared by the Indian Army showed soldiers and sniffer dogs searching through deep snow around the crushed metal containers.
In a video shared by Indian Army on X, formerly Twitter, an unnamed survivor said: “The snow was relentless, but the Army team acted swiftly. Whoever could be rescued immediately was pulled out, and our treatment began without delay. We received full support.”
The avalanche struck the highway less than 5km from the popular Hindu temple of Badrinath, which is visited by hundreds of thousands of devotees each year.
Avalanches and landslides are common in the Himalayas, particularly during the winter months. However, scientists warn that climate change is making extreme weather events more severe and unpredictable.
A 2023 report by the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development found that glaciers in the Himalayas melted 65 percent faster in the 2010s compared with the previous decade, indicating the increasing impact of rising temperatures.
The resulting erosion of glacial slopes has heightened the risk of floods, landslides, and avalanches, endangering millions living in mountainous areas.
The region has witnessed devastating disasters in recent years.
In 2021, more than 200 people were killed when a section of a glacier collapsed in Uttarakhand, sending a deadly mix of ice, rock and water hurtling through a mountain gorge and destroying a dam in its path.
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