Race against time for Laos cave rescuers as focus shifts to newly discovered shaft

CNN

By Rebecca Wright, Kocha Olarn, Angie Puranasamriddhi, June Jeong, Laura Sharman, Sana Noor Haq, CNN

Vientiane, Laos (CNN) — Rescuers in Laos are racing against time to find two men trapped in a flooded cave network, days after one person was rescued and four others crawled to freedom.

Earlier, rescuers said they were investigating a possible “knocking response” deep inside the cave network. “We still cannot confirm that the knocking sounds came from trapped victims. However, we can confirm that there were definite knocking sounds in response to the signals,” Thai specialist cave diver Kengkard Bongkawong told CNN by phone earlier Monday.

Later Monday, another member of the rescue crew downplayed reports of these sounds.

“There has been a lot of reporting suggesting that we heard knocking back. That is absolutely not true,” Josh Richards, an Australian diver, told CNN on Monday evening.

Instead, Richards said the noise “could have been bats” or “the wind coming in.” “A lot of these caves have fishes through them as well, or very unusual sounds coming down from below. They didn’t sound like they were echoes or anything like that,” he said.

Earlier reports of response sounds came as rescuers rappelled down a newly discovered vertical shaft that may provide a safer entry into a flooded cave and lead to a chamber where the men could be.

A team of divers are waiting for authorities to bring advanced scanning equipment that can produce a clear map of the cave, Kengkard told CNN.

Rescuers could potentially use that equipment while being lowered down the shaft, which would provide a clear picture of the cave’s layout, added Kengkard.

Rescuers said earlier Monday that they’d heard knocking responses on at least two occasions in the last 24 hours.

Thai rescue technician Manat Artmongkron said that the response was heard 70 meters (230 feet) down the shaft.

The villagers’ ordeal began on May 20 when eight men entered a cave in central Laos in search of gold, but became trapped when heavy rain blocked the exit.

A survivor managed to raise the alarm, triggering a complex operation involving experts who were summoned from around the world to the country’s central Xaisomboun province.

Five men emerged alive from the tunnel on Friday and Saturday, leaving rescuers searching for the remaining two, who are thought to have entered separately via a different route.

What’s next in the Laos cave rescue?

Divers are “not entirely sure” what the next steps of the rescue plan will entail, according to Richards, after they “couldn’t identify any way” down a newly-discovered point of entry.

Attention turned Monday to the vertical cave shaft that plunges more than 100 meters (328 feet) into a dark chamber that rescuers hoped would provide a safer entry into a flooded cave.

But Richards warned that the shaft was “completely full of rockfall and landslide.” “We’re not entirely sure what the next steps are,” he said in a video clip on Monday.

The rescue team is due to have a meeting evening local time to firm up their plan of action, according to Richards.

Richards said in a video clip on Sunday: “From what we know, there is a significant air pocket that is considerably further on – another 100 meters or so.” Although the air pocket is an “amazing find,” it’s a “fairly lethal passage,” he added.

He described this stretch as an “even tighter and more unpleasant” passage than anything the divers have traversed so far, and the “only place” where the missing two could be.

Rescuers were working with a map drawn with the aid of the five survivors and they hope the shaft will connect to another passage beyond the chamber where they were found.

Conditions at the cave entrance remain challenging, with the latest rainfall causing flash flooding.

Bounkham Luanglath, president of the Lao People’s Volunteer Association, said Monday that work continues to “pump water out to drain the cave as quickly as possible.”

Other methods include blocking water sources in the area and building more water retention ponds, on top of the existing one, to prevent further flooding.

Of the survivors, one was guided to safety on Friday, while the other four managed to escape unaided the next day after extensive efforts to drain the floodwater from the area.

All five are recovering in hospital after surviving for more than a week on water and sleep to preserve their strength before help arrived.

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CNN’s Becky Anderson contributed reporting.