- Rescuers used thermal drones to search the Rasuwagadhi hydropower tunnel in Nepal
- At least 93 workers are feared trapped and remain untraceable in the tunnel
- The rescue team included Nepali Army personnel, engineers, and drone operators
Rescuers searching a flood-hit hydropower project in Nepal reached the far end of a tunnel using thermal drones but found no survivors. At least 93 workers were feared trapped in the Rasuwagadhi Hydropower Project tunnel in Rasuwa district and now remain untraceable.
The operation at Rasuwagadhi involved Nepali Army personnel, engineers and a drone team. The rescuers entered the tunnel after flooding in the Bhote Koshi river raised fears that workers could have been stranded at its far end.
The team managed to reach the endpoint and used drones to search the interior, including areas that would have been difficult or dangerous to inspect directly. But there was no indication that anyone was inside.
The Prime Minister's Secretariat said on Monday that the Army-led team had returned after searching the tunnel of the 111-megawatt Rasuwagadhi project.
Once the drone team found that there was no one in the tunnel, the search was abandoned and the rescuers returned to Dhunche in Rasuwa district.
Hundreds of workers were underground in several hydropower projects in Nepal when floodwaters ravaged the country, killing hundreds. In several locations rescuers struggled to establish whether those reported missing are trapped inside tunnels, have escaped to higher ground, or have been carried away by the floods.
More than 900 people have been killed, while roughly 4,500 remain missing since Wednesday.
Nepal's National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority (NDRRMA) said on Monday that 933 people associated with hydropower projects were missing.
Rescuers have so far brought 279 people out of hydropower tunnels. That includes 254 people rescued from the Upper Trishuli-1 project and another 18 from the Langtang Khola site.
The Independent Power Producers' Association, Nepal (IPPAN) has separately said that 897 people employed at 11 hydropower projects in Rasuwa and Nuwakot remain out of contact.
