In brief
- The two workers were pulled from the tunnel at the Upper Trishuli 3A Hydropower Station.
- The two are being taken to a hospital in Kathmandu, officials said.
Two hydropower workers were pulled alive on Friday from a tunnel buried by debris in Nepal, a rare ray of hope on the tenth day of rescue efforts after catastrophic Himalayan flooding.
Rescuers cheered as one man was pulled through a muddy opening, a video released by the energy ministry showed.
He was helped to his feet by rescuers, and later carried on the backs of the emergency workers, raising his hand as they took him towards a helicopter.
A photograph showed the second man caked in mud, his hands pressed together in prayer, as rescuers carried him away on an orange stretcher.
"As long as there is breath, there is hope!" energy minister Biraj Bhakta Shrestha said in a statement.
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"Rescue operations are continuing in all the affected tunnels. Let everyone's efforts and prayers continue. We have not lost hope."
Rescuers called it a "miracle" after the 26 August glacial and mountain collapse on the China-Nepal border killed at least 1,308 people and left more than 5,600 missing.
"I am so happy, my heart is lighter," Amir Maharjan, the brother of rescued worker Kabir Maharjan, told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
The rescued men, both Nepali, were named as Sanjay Sah, 30, a mechanical foreman, as well as Maharjan, 45, a mechanical supervisor, by home minister Sudan Gurung.
Sah, speaking on video broadcast on Nepali media shortly after his rescue, said he had survived by chanting Hindu prayers during the days in the dark.
"What day is today? I was chanting maha mantra inside," Sah said, adding that he believed more workers may be inside the tunnel.
"There were as many as 40 or 45 people ... I told them and everyone to run out," he said of the moment the disaster struck.
Both men were reported to be in stable condition, and were receiving treatment in a Kathmandu hospital, the energy ministry said.
Australian tunnel rescue expert joins rescue effort
The rescued pair were among hundreds of hydropower workers missing after a wall of mud and debris swept through the region on 26 August, following a massive glacial and rock collapse on a mountain on the China-Nepal border.
Searches continued at the Trishuli 3A tunnel, where the two men were rescued, as well as atmultiple other sites, with at least 12 hydropower projects smashed by the floods.
Extra soldiers had been sent on Friday to boost the search operation where the men were saved.
The government had initially said it believed more than 100 workers could be alive inside multiple tunnels.
Nepali rescuers, aided by experts from India, China and South Korea, had repeatedly hit walls of hard-packed debris in their search for survivors.
Until Friday, none of the tunnel workers had been confirmed alive.
Australian rescue expert Arnold Dix, who has been supporting the operation remotely, told AFP that the rescue efforts were "back in miracle country" after a "week of 24/7 heartache".
Earlier on Friday, Dix, president of the International Tunnelling and Underground Space Association, said teams at the Trishuli 3A hydropower project believed they had heard a faint response from inside the tunnel.
He said rescuers had called into the tunnel: "Don't worry, we are rescuing you."
"They believe they received a faint response from inside saying, 'hunchha', yes or OK," Dix told AFP, adding that he was en route to Nepal to join the rescue effort.
"Right now, I'm 'glass three-quarters full' ... After a week of 24/7 heartache, we might, just, be back in miracle country," he said.
Dix said teams had dug through debris blocking the tunnel for 50 to 60 metres and had been hoping for a breakthrough at any moment.
Less than an hour later, rescuers pulled the two men to safety.
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