Five missing villagers found inside Laos cave, two still missing

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“We’ve found five people alive and all safe.”

That’s the positive update Laotian nonprofit organization Rescue Volunteer for People gave on the five villagers who went missing inside a flooded cave last week.

The villagers were found by elite divers, the organization stated. However, it’s now a race against time to find two other individuals who also vanished.

The five people — who went missing a week ago — were found sitting on a rock that was surrounded by floodwater inside an underground cave located in the province of Xaisomboun, situated more than 80 km north of Lao’s capital, Vientiane, CNN reported.

In GoPro footage of the rescue, rescuers can be seen crawling through narrow passageways submerged in water. They can be heard telling the villagers, “Don’t cry, don’t cry,” as they were located.

Villagers went searching for gold, wildlife

Rescue teams from Laos and Thailand are involved in the rescue efforts, Rescue Volunteer for People noted.

The seven people were a part of a group of Xaisomboun villagers who had gone into the cave on May 20, reportedly in search of gold deposits and wildlife. They were trapped after the cave’s entrance was blocked, BBC News reported.

Rescue diver Mikko Paasi, of Finland, said rescuers had to navigate “hundreds of metres of constant restrictions, flood waters, collapse hazards and high risk of contaminated air quality” inside the cave.

Passi estimated the seven villagers were trapped around 300 metres from the exit.

Baeng, a Laotian rescuer, told AFP the cave area is “not owned by anybody, noting locals usually “go there to dig holes and look for food.”

Team famous for rescuing Thai soccer team

The team of 15 divers aren’t strangers to such dangerous rescue missions. They were instrumental in recovering a group of Thai youth soccer players from a cave in June 2018 , an operation that garnered worldwide attention.

The divers faced narrow tunnels and collapse hazards, clearing around 15 metres of obstacles to reach the trapped villagers, the New York Post reported.

Paasi said it was a “race against time” to rescue the villagers.

Thai diver Kengkad Bongkawong told CNN the cave entrance was “so narrow that you have to tilt sideways, duck low, and crawl flat on your stomach to get through.”

The dive team worked over the weekend through the cave, but had to stop due to rising floodwaters. At one point they were about 40 metres from reaching the villagers before being forced to turn back.

Once found, the five villagers appeared to be “healthy and in good spirits,” said Paasi.

While they’ve been found, the villagers are still trapped by floodwaters. Officials are working on an extraction plan.

For now, Paasi said the task for him would be to “dive straight back” and bring the villagers more supplies to help them regain their strength for the trek out of the cave.

After extracting them, Bongkawong told CNN the villagers will be physically assessed and provided with liquid and gel food.

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