“Chances slim in finding two still-missing Laotians”

Rescuers searching for two people still trapped inside a flooded gold mine in Laos say the chances of finding them are becoming increasingly slim after teams nearly completed a search of the entire underground tunnel network without success.

Finnish cave diver Mikko Paasi said rescue teams have searched about 95% of the mine but have found no trace of the two missing men. He said the five people found alive earlier did not even know that two others were also believed to be trapped.

“We don’t have many places left to look,” Paasi said. “The chances are very slim of locating these guys,” he said in an exclusive interview with ThaiPBS World.

He said rescuers are also considering the possibility that there may have been only five miners trapped inside in the first place.

“We asked the five we found yesterday about the other two, and they didn’t even know there were supposed to be seven,” he said.

Paasi added, however, that the mother of one missing miner has been waiting outside the mine and insists that her son remains unaccounted for.

“There are places we can’t reach because they are too tight and too narrow, but they are full of water and there’s no dry place for people to stay for a week,” he said.

The diver described conditions inside the mine as extremely dangerous, with muddy floodwater reducing visibility to zero and forcing rescuers to search entirely by touch.

“When we are underwater and trying to look for them, we literally feel with our legs and arms,” he said. “You can’t see anything.”

Paasi, who previously took part in the 2018 Tham Luang cave rescue in Thailand, said the Laos mine is even more dangerous because of its narrow, hand-dug passages and constant risk of collapse.

Mikko Paasi was among the rescue divers granted a royal decoration by His Majesty the King to honour the multi-national group of experts involved in rescuing the 12 boys and their coach trapped in a flooded cave in Chiang Rai in 2018.//AFP

Unlike the vast chambers inside Tham Luang cave, the Laos mine consists of extremely tight tunnels in which divers sometimes need to exhale just to squeeze through.

He warned that the mine can flood rapidly during rainfall, with water levels capable of rising within minutes.

Rescuers are currently considering two options to extract the five survivors. One is to pump water out of the mine, while the other would be to carrying out a risky underwater diving operation through the flooded passages.

“We need to really consider the options here at the moment… The weather is now partly cloudy, but it will get worse because we are in the rainy season over here. Time is also not on our side, so we should make some decisions quite fast.” Paasi said.

According to Paasi, pumping water out would be the safest solution, but rescue teams have struggled for days to position pumps inside the narrow tunnels.

“We’ve tried [to pump the water out] for days now and it still doesn’t work,” he said.

If that fails, divers may have no choice but to guide the survivors through submerged passages, despite the fact that they are not trained divers.

Still, Paasi said the miners appeared to be in surprisingly good condition when rescuers first reached them, likely because they had entered the mine prepared to stay underground for several days and had brought food and water supplies with them.

“I think it’s mainly because of the type of mining they did here. They were planning to go inside for several days, which means they took water and some food with them,” he said.

Paasi said the men were also mentally resilient because of their experience working in confined underground spaces.

“They are miners, mine workers, so they are do not get claustrophobic,” he said. “They are used to working in these tight spots. These are two benefits that I see straight away that keep them strong and in good mental health,” he opined.