Search in Laos cave stalls as villagers remain unseen

For the seventh straight day, rescuers have been unable to make contact with seven villagers trapped inside a flooded cave in Laos after flash flooding blocked the exit. Operations have moved from land access to hard-to-reach underwater passages, with teams ex

For the seventh day, rescuers kept pressing toward a flooded cave in Laos—working in cold, narrow corridors where heavy rain and flash flooding shut off the exit and left seven villagers unseen. No contact has been made with them since they became trapped.

The villagers entered the cave in Xaisomboun province on May 19. Heavy rain triggered flash flooding that blocked the way out, according to Lao and Thai rescue teams involved in the operation.

On Tuesday. the Lao organization Rescue Volunteer for People said the day’s plan would include exploring air shafts above the cave in hopes of identifying possible access points and locating the trapped people. Rescue teams from neighboring Thailand also arrived at the site over the weekend to assist.

Divers have already pushed into the flooded cave about 100 meters, rescuers said. They believe the trapped villagers may be about 30 meters beyond the furthest point currently accessible. To aid the search, rescuers have been pumping water out of the cave.

The site is remote, in Xaisomboun province’s Longcheng district, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) north of Vientiane. Rescuers detailed the conditions on social media, pointing to difficult mountainous terrain and ongoing heavy rain that have hampered the operation.

Thai rescuers’ videos showed that reaching the cave’s entrance requires a steep hike on foot of roughly 4 kilometers (2.5 miles). Once there. the entrance is steep and rocky and barely wide enough for a single person to climb through at a time. Inside. the route becomes harder still: rescuers have to move through muddy passageways. flooded sections and narrow tunnels that force them to crawl forward.

Authorities have not officially confirmed why the villagers went into the cave. But rescuers involved said they entered to look for gold deposits.

Bounkham Luanglath of the Lao rescue group told The Associated Press that the cave was frequented by local residents looking for gold, even though authorities had repeatedly warned them against entering the cave out of safety concerns.

The stakes for those trapped are high in ways that go beyond getting to them. Rescue specialists warn that cold can quickly lead to hypothermia. The body can cope for weeks without food, but clean water is necessary to prevent dehydration. Contaminated water can cause diarrhea, which can hasten dehydration.

Limited air also creates a separate threat: declining oxygen levels can produce symptoms similar to altitude sickness and. over time. can damage lungs and other organs. Carbon dioxide buildup can cause exhaustion and eventual unconsciousness. And constant darkness disrupts time perception and the body’s circadian rhythms. while also causing extreme sensitivity when eyes must adjust again to light.

The public attention in Thailand has been sharp. in part because the unfolding effort echoes the dramatic 2018 cave rescue in northern Thailand. when 12 boys and their soccer coach were trapped for more than two weeks before being safely rescued. During that earlier operation, a former Thai navy SEAL diver was killed.

Another recent cave tragedy also weighed on the coverage: earlier this month. five Italian divers were found dead after they went missing while diving into a cave in the Maldives. A Maldivian military diver who was part of the recovery team was killed during the high-risk effort to retrieve their bodies.

In Laos, information has remained tightly controlled. The Laos Foreign Ministry said Tuesday it has no official information to share with the media. Laos is a one-party communist state with no organized opposition, and the government keeps a tight lid on information.

The operation continues, with teams trying to combine ground access, underwater search and exploration of air shafts above the cave—hoping the next reachable point will lead them to the seven villagers who have been trapped since May 19 and have had no contact since.

Laos cave rescue Xaisomboun province flooded cave villagers trapped Thai rescue teams Rescue Volunteer for People Vientiane gold deposits