Meghalaya Mining Disaster: Navy divers launch operation to rescue 15 miners

Shillong, Dec 30: The rescue operations for the 15 trapped miners were started on Sunday morning as the Indian Navy divers and Odisha Fire Services teams were yet to arrive at the spot.

The rescue operation has been scaled up since yesterday with the arrival of high-powered pumps. A team of 11 naval divers will join the operation today.

The navy divers are carrying sophisticated equipment, including underwater Remotely Operated Vehicles, to find the men in the "rat-hole" mine, a navy release said on Saturday.

The navy had recently sent a survey team comprising an officer and two divers to assess the nature of the rescue operation. A team from Kirloskar Brothers Ltd - a heavy equipment company that has agreed to assist in the rescue efforts - also dropped by to take stock of the situation.

National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) Assistant Commandant Santosh Kumar Singh has briefed the team leader of the navy divers and the chief fire officer of Odisha Fire Services on the rescue operation. "The navy divers with NDRF personnel have gone down the mine at the water surface. We have done a survey. They have been briefed and it will take a bit of time, I am told. But from tomorrow morning (Sunday), we are restarting the rescue operations all over again," he said.

The biggest challenge for the authorities is the unavailability of the mine map or blue print of the mine that was being operated illegally. "We don't have the mining map. This is going to be very tough challenge for all of us," J Borah, a senior officer of state-run Coal India Limited, said.

The accident took place on December 13. A surviving member of the team of miners that entered the illegal mine said 22 people had entered the "rat-holes" that barely fit a man.