BANGKOK — Rescue divers in Laos on Friday night safely evacuated the first of five local villagers who had been trapped in a cave for more than a week by floodwaters.
Lao and Thai rescue workers posted the news on social media, along with a video showing the first rescued villager with a lamp strapped to his forehead. The villager, who was not immediately identified, was walking unsteadily with the assistance of two men. They handed him over to other team members amid a waiting crowd for a medical check.
The five had been found by divers on Wednesday, but that left rescue workers with two serious tasks: extricating the five and finding two more who are still missing.
Evacuations of the other four were suspended until Saturday because they were not ready, said Chakkit Taengtang of Sai Than Association, one of the Thai rescue organization at the scene.
Rescue teams had pumped water out of the flooded cave’s passages on Friday, but a morning rainstorm complicated their work. The trapped men have already been supplied with water, soft food and foil blankets to keep them warm.
The villagers had reportedly entered the cave last week to look for valuable minerals before being trapped by flash flooding that blocked their way out. One other villager escaped in time and alerted the authorities to the seven left behind.
A video shot inside the cave on Thursday vividly illustrated the desperation the trapped men were feeling.
Thai rescue diver Norrased Palasing spoke with a trapped villager named Khamla, who urged the divers to let the group attempt to swim out immediately
“I can’t go on. I don’t have any strength,” he said.
Norrased sought to reassure him, telling him that the water was being drained, and handing over blankets and food. He cautioned Khamla to eat slowly to avoid digestive problems.
Divers from several nations joined the rescue effort
Rescue teams from Laos and neighboring Thailand were joined by Japanese and Malaysian colleagues. Indonesian and French specialists also had been reported to be coming to the site in a rugged area in the central province of Xaisomboun, about 75 miles north of the capital, Vientiane.
Working in the dark in unfamiliar surroundings, divers had to make their way through twisting, narrow, flooded passages with jagged walls.
A good rescue plan depends on “the length of the dives involved, the restrictions and the sheer size of the passages that they are in, and the support that’s available,” said Gary Mitchell, press officer for the South & Mid Wales Cave Rescue Team, which is associated with the British Cave Rescue Council.
Other necessities normally include the space and equipment to recharge air or oxygen cylinders, and a medical team.
Rescuers must weigh risks of waiting for flooding to recede
At the same time, rescuers must weigh the high risks of guiding survivors without diving skills through zero-visibility water against the strategy of waiting for water levels to recede, said Mitchell, who took part in the complicated 2018 cave rescue in northern Thailand of 12 schoolboys and their soccer coach. Several of the divers at the Lao site had also taken part in the Thai rescue.
“You can’t leave people underground too long without medical support, without proper food, sustenance, clean water … before their condition is going to deteriorate,” Mitchell warned Thursday from Wales in a video interview.
The five found Wednesday were identified by their first names as Khamla, Mued, Ee, Ing and Laen. They were reportedly in good health but exhausted from dehydration and lack of food.
A video filmed by Norrased showed the emotional moment he and Finnish diving instructor Mikko Paasi emerged from the water and discovered the trapped men sitting on a rock surrounded by floodwater.
Mued delivered a message to his family on camera, saying, “Don’t worry mom, dad. I’m still strong, I’m still healthy. Tomorrow I will be home. I love you, mom and dad.”
Lao officials say the villagers normally forage in the mountainous surroundings for a living.
The villagers are believed to have been searching for gold
The villagers had been reported to have entered the cave to look for gold deposits. Bounphong Khammanyvong, a local official in Longcheng, the district where the cave is located, said they had noticed rocks or sand with unusual colors in the cave, so they entered it in the hope of digging them out to see if they were valuable.
Bounphong, in an interview on Thursday with local media outlet Xaisomboun Province Television, said the villagers entered the cave on May 20, contradicting rescuers who put the date at May 19.
Saksornchai and Peck write for the Associated Press. AP journalists Danica Kirka in London and Haruka Nuga in Bangkok contributed to this report.
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