Tunnel rescue: Vertical boring underway, here's what happens now

 Rescuers began drilling into the hill above the Silkyara-Barkot tunnel on Sunday, boring nearly 20 metres on the first day of adopting the new approach to reach 41 workers trapped inside for 14 days.

The vertical approach was one of the at least five options on which preparatory work had begun some days back, as anxiety mounted over the fate of the men trapped in the under-construction tunnel on Uttarakhand's Char Dham route.

Rescue workers have to drill down 86 metres to reach the tunnel. By evening, the heavy drilling equipment had bored down to about 19.5 metres.

National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited (NHIDCL) managing director Mahmood Ahmed said vertical boring would be over by Thursday if there are no hurdles.

As the drilling progresses, 700-mm wide pipes are being inserted to create an escape passage. A little distance away, a thinner, 200-mm probe is being pushed in. It has reached the 70-metre mark. The vertical boring option was picked as the next best alternative after the latest in a series of snags that hit the horizontal drilling operation from the tunnel's Silkyara-end, where an estimated 60-metre stretch of rubble faced rescue workers.